Its 9 am on Thanksgiving and I'm already stuffed...

Let the holidays begin!

So I get up this morning and think, "well since it is a holiday I might as well splurge". So instead of my normal just coffee breakfast, or coffee and some oatmeal, I gobble (get it...ha, ha) down a large (and I do mean large) pecan banana nut muffin with real butter. I can feel my arteries clogging up already and I'm so stuffed that the thought of Thanksgiving dinner in three hours is not appealing at all.

My question is this....why is Thanksgiving dinner SO early in the Midwest? Seems everyone eats it at what they call "dinner" which is really lunch. My recollections of Thanksgiving when I was younger was we'd eat around 3 in the afternoon. Which meant that there were small appetizers from noon on and the main meal was sometime between a normal lunch and dinner. This meant that you finished pumpkin pie about 4, played games, then ate some more and the day was pretty much done. I always feel somehow cheated here in the Midwest (never mind the PAPER plates that are so often used....what happened to china?) in that you were done with the holiday in the middle of the day and it was over.

It has taken me years to get used to this and I still long for the three pm (ish) Thanksgiving dinner. Since I refuse to cook dinner myself (long story, I'll save it for another time) I always go to other people's houses for dinner, so I refuse to complain too much and am very thankful for friends who open their houses and families up to me and mine.

This year I'm headed to my friend Michelle's house. It is at noon and I'm bringing sweet potato casserole. I have no idea if we'll use paper plates, but I do know one thing, I'll be in good company and since my family is so far away that is the most important thing. I'll get over the "dinner" time and paper plates.