Turduckens and Thanksgiving

Gulf Shores, AL     High:  71    Low:  52

Turducken leftovers anyone? Hunh? What's a turducken, you ask? It's a de-boned chicken stuffed inside a de-boned duck, stuffed inside a de-boned turkey. Any gaps in the layers are stuffed with sage dressing or stuffing.  It looks something like this:

There are varieties on this....a gooducken is a goose stuffed with a duck, stuffed with a chicken. And for vegans, there's always the meat substitute "turkey" with tofu called a turfucken. Seriously, I did not make that up, it's really out there. Sounds obscene, doesn't it?  :-) Sparky will wisely not make any comments on how that one probably tastes. :-)

Did we have a turducken for Thanksgiving? Naw, too expensive, around 75-85 dollars.....but bet some people did.

In the morning, Eldy and I watched a little of Macy's parade, kind of a tradition in both of our families and a tradition in our country, 86 years and running. Pretty amazing the details about the parade balloons.....Sparky loved the "Jolly Polly Pirate Ship", an elaborate 40 foot tall float with Whoopi Goldberg and the Kool-Aid Man piloted as a "balloonicle". When a new balloon is added, it's guaranteed a run of three years. There have been 6 versions of Snoopy over 36 years, making him the longest participating balloon. No Snoopy this year, Charlie Brown was standing in. Some more interesting facts about the parade...The longest balloon is 78 feet! Pikachu is the first special effects balloon, his cheeks light up. SpongeBob Squarepants was the first square balloon, showing up two years ago. It takes 600 (!) internal tie lines to keep his shape. The first Macy's parade started in 1924, and the first balloons started in 1927.

We didn't plan our Thanksgiving dinner very well, Sparky had convinced Eldo to try Cracker Barrel's offerings for 9.99 a person, easily the best deal in town. We arrived shortly after the beginning turkey day dinner serving time of 11:00 AM, and found the wait to be an hour. We didn't want to wait, and thought there might be some better food offerings out there if we looked some more. We decided to peruse the Mullet Wrapper, a local happenings paper that has just about everything going on in the Gulf Shores and surrounding area. There was only one restaurant left that hadn't filled up on reservations, Ginny Lane's Bar and Grill in nearby Orange Beach.

You wouldn't think a bar and grill would have a very good Thanksgiving dinner, would you? But the grill delivered...we had a great meal at a reasonable price--17.00--salad choices, then turkey-- both light and dark served with giblet gravy, mashed potatoes, cornbread stuffing, sweet potato casserole which was excellent, green bean casserole, and the standard pumpkin pie. Sparky sweet talked the waiter (she's pretty good at that, explains Eldy) into swapping the pumpkin pie out for a wonderful key lime pie instead. Everything was absolutely wonderful from the salad with terrific blue cheese dressing to the dessert. Normal prices are in the moderate range...We'd definitely go back to try it again. Everything was fresh and tasty, and portions were just right.

Back home...Eldy watched football, Sparky read......It cools down FAST in the late afternoon with the sun setting, so Sparky bundled up....

and dozed....(And I just had to document Sparky actually slowing down for a minute and not going a million miles an hour! explains E.)

Now THAT'S the way to spend Turkey Day! Just wished family was closer to have had them there with us, too.

Bye for now.........