Happy Thanksgiving!

[Edwin]

Happy Thanksgiving to all from America who celebrate, and to all those filipinas and filipinos who celebrate with the Americans! We have a lot to be thankful for! In school we studied about Christopher Columbus and his voyages and adventures. We admired him and his crew for what they did. We visualized that first Thanksgiving with the Native American Indians on the East Coast! It was triumphant and romantic, and I visualize them all sitting at very long picnic tables enjoying turkey and apple pie together with some whip cream on top! It has always been a fun filled holiday when we would always get together and sometimes eat more than we should! When I was a little boy Mom, Dad, and our family invited friends over who actually lived just a few miles from where we live right now. Mom was extremely embarrassed because I had not qualms about letting bad gas at the table, because I was a little boy. I still remember her talking to me about that later, and I think she wanted to crawl under the table, but it didn't bother me!

Well, another take on Thanksgiving is the newest opinion the Native American Indians have about Thanksgiving! I have a little Native American Ancestry in me, but I am as much from Scotland as I am from the Native American ancestry, so I am as much white as I am Indian, even though I consider myself to be a white Indian, Cherokee from the East, and South East USA, and then more recently from Oklahoma, which my Indian grandmother came from. The Indians do not see Columbus as a hero, rather they see him lately as a criminal who brought people to exploit their land, and bring diseases that killed their people. Well, that may be true, and I am sorry, but that was then, and this is now, and I am still going to enjoy eating cranberries, turkey, and apple pie! How about you?

Another take on Thanksgiving is when my now dead brother-in-law lived in Guimaras Island in the Philippines those 14 wonderful years for him, his filipina wife, and their filipina families, and yes, he was rich by our standards and he blessed them with money, property, and education for many of them in her family. Thanksgiving was a big deal for him, so he gave the orders, he was good at that! His filipina wife cooked the Thanksgiving dinner, and they invited all their filipino families to enjoy with them as well as his retired ex military friends there in the Philippines. Now that he has been dead since last April sadly for his filipina wife, their families, and his sister Carol, his filipina wife, says no more Thanksgivings, and that is sad for all!

[Smiley]

Happy Thanksgiving to all of our American friends.

[Edwin]

We had lots of delicious food at our Thanksgiving celebration with our youngest daughter, her daughter, one of their friends, Carol and I, and 4 dogs, 3 of which they had to keep separated because they were just on the verge of being ready to fight each other, and they are very good doggies!!!! I didn't overeat. I took a little of everything, and while I was eating it was so good, that I thought, why didn't I take some more of this, or that, but after I was finished I thought that I had as much pleasure from eating those things as I would have if I had eaten a lot more, and then I was comfortable afterwards as well. I came home and ate a half of a huge, dark, slightly sweetened Hershey chocolate bar and drank a large glass of milk, and that was the perfect ending to a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner!

[red]

It is our first thanksgiving to experience in America and wow, lots of preparation. We did not cook though instead I went to observe my husband's eldest daughter cooking pies and turkey! Now I have an idea so probably will prepare next thanksgiving myself mix with Filipino taste maybe. My first time to taste pumpkin pie. Until this time there are lots of pies to eat yet. T'is the season to gain more weight.

[Edwin]

Red, when my brother married his first wife, she was skinny as a rail. I still look at some of those wedding pictures and think, "What a skeleton she was!" Well, she started having babies and putting on weight. I'm not sure the two are related, but that is when she started putting on the weight. It was not too long until she was quite a bit over weight. Her mother was not a Christian, and I hope she repented in the end, but she said the reason Karen gained all that weight was those d....mn church potlucks! Well, I don't think so, it was her lack of restraint that caused the weight gain. Her famous saying was, "I am going on a diet just as soon as the holiday dinners are finished! I guess they were never finished, because she never went on a diet, nor did she lose any weight! She started having problems with her heart, and then she did lose until she looked unhealthily thin. She overcame her heart problems and gained some weight, which was good. Now she still has a leaking heart, and because of it her blood is not good, and she needs periodic blood transfusions. The lastest thing is that her kidneys have failed, stage 4 or 5, I can't remember which. They want her on dialysis, but she doesn't want to, but she will not live long without dialysis. The friend we talked with told us that she expected her daughters to put pressure on her to do the dialysis.

Pumpkin pies are wonderful. This building store, "Home Depot," where I have been getting a lot of my buiding supplies was selling carving pumpkins for Halloween. They had a lot left over, I mean a huge, huge box, and so they put a sign on the box free pumkins, so I loaded up with them. I was wishing I had gotten more, but Carol didn't want any more. She has cooked all but 2 of them, and have them in the freezer, and are they ever good! She made some Thanksgiving pumkin pies with them, and wow, were they ever good!!!!