Happy Black Friday! I’m writing this on Thursday night, after a lovely day spent with friends (I also communicated a bunch with my daughters and will see them soon). I hope you all had a nice day yesterday and aren’t going nuts spending money today. I need gas, so I will get some on the way to my park walk early in the morning, but I don’t plan on buying anything else on Friday, either online or in person. After the walk, I intend to hibernate at home, read for a while, and maybe watch a movie. Of course, I will also be writing and scheduling my posts for this weekend. As far as other writing, meh. Not motivated.
You’ll be happy to know I was able to get the tri-tip and mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner at the Claim Jumper restaurant, which I highly recommend as a great place to eat if you don’t feel like cooking. Everything was delicious! As I’ve mentioned, I’m not a turkey fan, so this meal was perfect for me. It came with a Caesar salad and veggies, plus pie, and I was too full for the pie so I got it to go. One of my friends invited us to her home for board games after dinner, and she had a pecan pie for us. Someone else brought a homemade lime/raspberry pie. I took a piece of each to go, which means that I now have three (3) pieces of pie in my fridge! That’s more pie than I’ve eaten all year.
I recently finished a fabulous novel: Hester by Laurie Lico Albanese. It was one of my Book of the Month Club selections and was published this year. This is a highly imaginative tale of what/who might have inspired Nathaniel Hawthorne to write The Scarlet Letter in 1850 and encompasses the Salem witch trials, slavery, the underground railroad, and various other historical events, but they aren’t simply told ~ they come alive with characters and plot lines woven into and around the life of Isobel, the first-person narrator and protagonist of Hester. The novel dazzles us with magical realism and contains multiple love and life stories stitched into a vibrant tapestry. The story is rich with detail, from colors to foods to scents to touch. I give it five stars.
What about you? Tell us about your Friday and link back to my TGIF post. Don’t forget to mention any pie you may have eaten or will be eating soon.
~*~
©️2022 Paula Light and Light Motifs II. No unauthorized use permitted.
Light Motifs II 
Glad to hear you had a lovely Thanksgiving day. Pie sounds good! Like you I can’t remember when last I had pie this year.
I enjoyed your book review of Hester….a vibrant and compelling recommendation!
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Thanks Suzette! 💙
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My blood sugar readings have been very good lately, but I went off the rails yesterday with potatoes, stuffing, rolls and cranberry sauce and I recorded my first reading over 200 in a while. I know that I should not have had that pumpkin pie and ice cream after that reading, but what the hell, Thanksgiving only comes along once a year.
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Back on the wagon! I haven’t had any pie yet…
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You’re a better man than I for even having the courage to check your blood sugar. I just figured I’d be better off not knowing, at least on this one day. We all went to an Italian restaurant for the whole meal. They had the traditional turkey dinner–bad enough, right?–and then a course with lots of pasta. What could go wrong? Oh. And dessert. We’ll have to dine exclusively on brussel sprouts and cardboard for a week or so to bring things back to normal. Worth it!
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Yikes!
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My blood sugar was basically back to normal this morning.
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Today really is Black Friday! After a year of working from home today was supposed to be my glorious (cough, choke, cough, cough) return to the office. Hard to believe I am almost happy that I woke up feeling under the weather and called in sick! I’m still sporting a headache but the meds have managed to cut through some of the haze.
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Yikes! Hope you can enjoy some of the weekend!
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sounds like you had a blast. and that pie seems to be mighty delicious. on top of that, you finished reading a book, you are on a rollercoaster! love it!
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Woohoo! 🤩
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Hello Paula,
Here is my llink.
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Thank you 💙
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Started working on new traditions with my girls over this Thanksgiving weekend.
Had a meal of Brined Turkey Breast (I love turkey BTW), boxed stuffing and another side which may have been roasted veggies. Mini Me and Evil Genius prefer to shop at Trader Joe’s and like their produce fresh. They cooked (he had to help since she’d just had minor hand surgery) after she and I had viewed a couple of episodes of The Crown together. Devil Child and her fiance arrived just as we were finishing the meal, bearing pies (homemade by his mom) leftover from his family gathering earlier that day in Grand Rapids.
Next day’s meal was a Honey Baked Ham. This is MM’s favorite and perpetual request for holidays, though given how expensive it has become we may rethink this for next year. Meal included the other box of stuffing (I bought both boxes, a packaged pumpkin pie and the ham which I’d almost forgotten I’d signed up to do!), smashed potatoes and creamed peas. We all liked the former so much, which MM had discovered online, that this dish may become part of this new tradition. The creamed peas were sort of an ode to my late former mother-in-law, though MM had found a new recipe for these, too, one that didn’t contain the very unhealthy ingredients the old lady’s recipe used!
My favorite part of the holiday was watching my sons-in-law working in the kitchen together while my daughters teased and talked about DC’s upcoming wedding plans.
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That’s awesome you got to spend the holiday with both your girls, Sue! 🙂
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