The Nightmare Before Thanksgiving

Uh oh.

My turkey still has feathers in it.

I'm not kidding.

Here is a photo as evidence, with a red circle indicating a sample of the foul plumage.

All right, so it's not quite Little House on the Prairie, but I still wasn't 100 percent thrilled to discover a new use for the pair of pliers I bought yesterday.

By now, you're probably wondering whether or not I have ever cooked a real Thanksgiving dinner. Rest assured that I have -- twice, in fact. This is one of the reasons that Colin and I offered to host Thanksgiving at our apartment (i.e. I have experience that the other Michiganders probably don't have.) Of course, I'm used to the turkey coming frozen, pre-packaged with a pop-up timer and a rope truss. I'm also used to having my own roasting pan, a full-sized conventional oven, a big cutting board, and a good, sharp knive.

Now, on the night before Thanksgiving, I find myself faced with the following:

1. A convection oven
2. A cheap 13 x 9 aluminum pan instead of a roaster
3. No pop-up timer (though I managed without one last year)
4. No rope truss (though I thankfully have a lot of alumimum foil)
5. A dull knive
6. A cutting board that would barely hold a cornish game hen

Oh, and let's not forget:

A 13-pound (6 kilo) raw turkey in a cardboard box.

Faced with adversity, I did what any self- respecting adult would do.

I called my mommy.

Dad answered the phone, at which point we began to realize that there was a 3- to 4-second delay in our connection. So, as you read the following recreated (and only slightly abbreviated) dialogue, you must insert an uncomfortable dramatic pause between each line.

"Dad?"

"Hello?"

"Dad?"

"Hello?"

"Dad, it's Amy."

"Hello? Oh, OK, we were talking at the same time, I think."

"Dad ... Dad, my turkey still has feathers in it."

"OK, let me get your mother." [Father knows best!]

"Hello?"

"Mom?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm calling for moral support."

"Ok......"

"My turkey still has feathers in it."

"BWA-HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!!!!!"


You can see how much sympathy I got out of her. After several minutes of thoughtful, caring, motherly speculation on how to manage my predicament, she had only one piece of advice:

"Amy?"

"Yea, Mom?"

"Take pictures."

To be continued....