How I Spent My Thanksgiving Vacation

Actually, as I write this it's 10:17 pm on Monday, so I still have another day-and-a-half or so of Thanksgiving Vacation left, hee-hee. :)

But the Thanksgiving part of it is over, so I'll share that with you in excruciating detail.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Brian & I left Austin around 11:30 am and had a nice drive. We drove past every color of tree you can imagine! I'm talking green and brown, sure, but also yellow and red and orange, and some really groovy combinations of those color pattens! Really gorgeous!

We rolled into Shreveport around 6:30 pm, where Mom put us up at the Fairfield Marriott. (She & her hubby are renovating the guest room at their pad, so she prang for a room in town.)

After we checked in, Mom & Step-dad picked us up and took us out to eat at an Outback Steakhouse, and I had some Shrimp & Fettuccine that made me weep! OMG!!! The shrimp, somehow, tasted like steak, and the fettuccine was simply heavenly! I swear that they must have made the past by hand, right there in the restaurant or something, because I have never had tastier pasta!!!

The conversation was good, also, naturally. It's been a while since we've seen Erminio (Step-Pops), though Mom & I have been keeping in touch via email.

Afterward, they dropped us back at the hotel around 9:00 pm, where we found the beds to be possibly the most comfortable, relaxation-inducing beds EVER!

Okay, that might be a bit of exaggeration.

But I wasn't exaggerating about the Shrimp & Fettuccine!

At All!

Brian & I don't have cable, and therefor don't get Cartoon Network at home, so it was a really pleasant surprise to fall asleep to a show called Total Drama Island! Very funny show! I need to Netflix it when it comes out on dvd.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

When I woke up, C.N. was playing a Tom & Jerry marathon. (Not my cup of tea, but it was cool to wake up to toons, none the less.)

The hotel served a complimentary breakfast that was nice. I usually think of huge bowls of scrambled eggs and stacks of sausage patties and bacon and maybe a vat of gravy when I think "complimentary breakfast", but what they served was a bit more sensible and healthy than that, lol. There were piles of fruit and single-serving cereals and oatmeal and bagels and muffins and the like.

And, they did have biscuits and gravy, though!

They also had a nuke-able bacon/egg/cheese sandwich, so I got my eggs & bacon that way.

It was good.

8:21 pm - Just got back from the Horseshoe Casino!!!

No, wait! This was AFTER the traditional family Thanksgiving!

It was cool! We got to Mom's & Erminio's around 9:30 am and hung out as she cooked & stuff. Gan-Gan has a little house on their land, and Brian & I hung out with her on her porch for a lot of the time, chatting with Gan-Gan and just digging on all the nature around us!

Sometimes family Thanksgivings can be super stress-filled, but today was super-chill. I even got a chance to check my email! And waiting in my Inbox was a Thanksgiving greeting from Her Hotness, my Gnomey Goddess, wishing us all a happy Thanksgiving!!! :D (I mean, how SWEET is she! They don't do Turkey-Day up UK-way!)

I think it was around 3:00 pm or so when we all sat down to give thanks -- by way of stuffing ourselves with tasty, tasty food and grunting and groaning at each other about how delicious the meal is and how we really shouldn't have another helping, but we're going to anyway -- and then we all sat around for a while, bloated and deliriously contented.

Then Mom & Brian & I walked a little of the meal off as she gave us the tour of their land. It's a huge patch, and I can't think of a better place for Mom to do her retirement-thang! Had Brian & I become rich and famous already, I don't know if either of us could have picked out a better spot to set her & Gan-Gan up in.

THEN...

...around 5:00 pm (after what felt like an already long and well-rounded day) Mom got jiggy wit it!

She lives in Louisiana, and yet she doesn't get to go gambling very often. So she took Brian & me to the Horseshoe, where we three proceeded to hit the slots.

I thought about joining a Texas Hold 'Em game, but chickened out at the last minute. I've been playing it on the computer for fake dollars, but I wasn't sure how long could hold my own against real folks. I would hate to have blown my gambling money in fifteen minutes, then spent the rest of the time following Brian around the slot machines.

Wrapping up Thanksgiving Day with some gambling is probably not what our Puritanical forefathers had in mind when they created the holiday, but I've got to say: I am THANKFUL on this day! :)

This has been an unbelievable day of abundance (and some excess, hee-hee) and family and ENJOYING family!

OH, YEAH!!! Entering the casino, I GOT CARDED! This is SO GROOVY to me because I'm pushing 40 and I'm STILL getting carded, lol! My li'l bro -- 4 years younger than me -- and he just strolls in with Mom. Me, they stop and ask to see my I.D.!

How is that possible? NO idea! But it's flattering! ;P

Brian & I fall asleep to a House marathon, which is cool because it was random episodes -- some we've already seen and some from this season, with characters that Brian hadn't met yet.

Then Friday Mom fixed us breakfast and we said our good-byes to Ermino and Mom and Gan-Gan and hit the road.

I spent Saturday vegging, spent yesterday with Stephen King's newest book of short stories, Just After Sunset, and I watched Hancock and The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian tonight before hunkering down to work on my current story.

I'm taking a break now, sort of rebooting the gray matter before I get back to my work.

And I kind of can't believe I've still got 8 more hours or so left in this day, as well as all of tomorrow before I have to get back to my "day job"!

A very nice vacation, indeed! :)