Thanksgiving and

 RantWoman is celebrating a season of peculiar gratitudes in this year of disease, dyspepsia and discontent.

Who knew the regular reappearance
of pink and white Christmas Cactuses
could make a person so happy

RantWoman would prefer to focus on images of peace, humility and justice grounded in spiritual traditions. Just now though the images clamoring around RantWoman's psyche include Sinter Klaus and Saint Lucy. Readers who need to wander in the details of morose moods are invited to use their own search engines for more information.

RantWoman wants to offer a festive shout-out to all families and family-like groupings where the family conflicts clamor out into view along with the holiday decorations. Can we all ask Santa to referee by Zoom conference?

Thanks partly to COVID paranoia and partly to realism about not even trying to fit the whole clan in anyone's kitchen long enough to finish feast prep and feast, the Rant family did not even try to gather. RantMom was looking forward to dining with neighbors at her retirement community. RantWoman repeated her silent prayer of gratitude that RantMom does not have to feel responsible for meal prep and therefore RantWoman does not have to fret about whatever neurological problems were making it really easy for RantMom to drop things in the kitchen. 

RantWoman planned both a general Zoom open house and a family Zoom hour. Both were big enough successes that RantWoman is glad to have upgraded to a paid Zoom account. RantWoman will try a couple more such events and promises to send out the invitations in a more timely way than this round. Surprise: the RantFamily Zoom time had to be postponed: Little Sister and Irrepressible Nephew cooked up a whole feast. Little sister had scouted Amazon for some appropriate delivery containers, including adorable 6" glass pie pans for the Pumpkin chiffon pie. Deliveries had to be made before the family could Zoom. 

RantWoman was deeply touched. RantWoman was also afflicted by #FirstWorldProblems quibbles. Green Bean casserole is not on RantWoman's must have list. The stuffing did not have enough celery for RantWoman's taste, and the right amount of sugar on yams is none. Nevertheless RantWoman truly enjoyed the feast!

Nephew did a GREAT job of packing hot things in one bag, cold things in another bag. Hah! Nephew is also driving for Door Dash and RantWoman definitely approves of his customer service standards. Nephew also shared details of a couple orders so small that RantWoman can definitely see the value of a minimum delivery charge. 

Turkey and Stuffing
at the leftovers stage

In other feast news, one of RantWoman's email lists posted the item about most preferred side dish in all 50 states. RantWoman does not understand why stuffing and cranberries did not pop out. 

RantWoman would also put a "Do not mess with people's comfort food" asterisk next to mac and cheese: RantWoman's household once share Thanksgiving with a friend whose family tradition included Mac and Cheese, By Mac and Cheese he meant: Boil some macaroni. Grate some Velveeta. Mix the pasta and the grated cheese in some kind of baking pan. Pop into the oven and bake until the cheese is melted and the top is brown and crispy. This creation has not landed on RantWoman's must have list but RantWoman enjoyed it once.

Call RantWoman a provocateur. RantWoman posted the question "what is sweet potato casserole?" Silly RantWoman: OF COURSE, it's the yams with butter and sugar and miniature marshmallows crisped all over the top. RantWoman's inquiry evoked some very colorful but mostl y good-natured responses about the difference between yams and sweet potatoes, yams around the world and of course discussions of the main food item and what should be added. RantWoman thinks the discussion had about run its course, but the list moderator is, um fussy and he has now called a halt to the yam wars. Okayyy. 

Now for an after holiday  travel and traffic gratitude. RantWoman is glad she had already decided to postpone some needed post-holiday grocery shopping before one's Twitter feed--not including any tidings from Metro--informs one of a serious injury accident likely to disrupt needed bus routes.

last night a hit and run driver struck and seriously injured a pedestrian at an intersection near RantWoman's apartment. There is a stop light at the intersection though RantWoman dos not know off the top of her head whether it is an accessible ped signal or an older model. RantWoman has not seen any other details of this accident. RantWoman hopes this is because the police are busy trying to capture the driver. See RantWoman is kind of a judgmental witch about #TrafficViolence. In fact, RantWoman is a little peeved to see some standard mindless #DefundSpd cop bashing in the twitter replies. Look world, RantWoman has no basis for knowing whether Seattle PD are as good at blaming pedestrians for getting hit by cars as some other jurisdictions, but for cripe's sake, if you are going to rag on cops, do it for the right reasons and Do not defiund Spd  at the very least until they catch the driver in this accident.

Ther. Now RantWoman will find some seasonal music, tend some paperwork, and see what she can do to get her holiday twitches under control