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Hello, my name is Judas Gutenberg and this is my blaag (pronounced as you would the vomit noise "hyroop-bleuach").



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   the thruple and the parrot
Thursday, November 22 2018
Today being Thanksgiving, it was my first paid holiday since Memorial Day (back when I still worked for Mercy For Animals). Gretchen and I would be driving down to Brooklyn for a big vegan gathering there, but first (after a special Thanksgiving-morning coffee) I wanted to take advantage of the non-workday daylight to gather a backpack load of firewood, so I set off with just my backpack to the pair of downed (and very dry) oaks just down the ravine from where the Stick Trail crosses the Chamomile. Both trees together probably contain enough wood for a half year of firewood needs (that is, about a cord). Since the ground is steep and treacherous getting down to the lower (and bigger) of these trees, I usually park my backpack at the Stick Trail and carry the individual bucked chunks (each of which weighs between 30 and 50 pounds) up from below in my arms. I then assemble the backpack load on the Stick Trail and hike it straight home. Today I wasn't even carrying a saw, meaning I could use my hands as I hiked. This comes in handy when climbing either the "mountain goat" path behind the woodshed or the steps near the house's south deck (which I've been using a bit more lately).
We left at about 2:0pm, bringing a bunch of food Gretchen had prepared: macaroni & cheese, shredded brussel sprouts, some kind of cobbler, and probably things I am forgetting. I'd washed a few dishes, but otherwise my role in the making of those things had been zero. Unfortunately, we would not be taking the dogs. It would be an unseasonably-cold Thanskgiving, so I packed the stove with wood, cranked the air back, and turned up the thermostat to 65 degrees F as a fossil-fuel-based floor through which the temperature in the house could not fall.
The traffic into the City was light, and though Google kept warning us about congestion in our route, it tended to melt away before we got to it. The one exception was a knot around the toll plaza on the Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge, but it's rarely clear sailing there. As always, Gretchen took over driving duties at the south end of the Palisades Parkway.
We had parking on the street near our destination in Park Slope, the brownstone owned by our friends Erica & Justin. When we arrived, there were already more than a dozen people there as well as a handful of dogs, many of them dressed up as turkeys. Little Harry was wearing an adorable sweater vest with a polka-dotted necktie sticking out of the collar. I just wanted to sit down with a glass of red wine, so I ended up sitting in the couches at the end of the apartment, talking to Erica's two parents, one of whom has an occasionally-impenetrable Isræli accent (especially in noisy conditions such as this one). Gretchen later told me that he's actually a supporter of Donald J. Trump. Every large Thanksgiving gathering has at least one!
I made the mistake of eating some sort of decadent vegan cheese wrapped in pastry flour, and it might have impacted my capabilities in the main event that eventually followed. Gretchen and I sat on the farthest end of the huge array of tables necessary to seat the two or three dozen people in attendance. There was a huge array of food available, but I mostly just liked the stuff Gretchen had made. At this point, my flavor expectations are heavily influenced by her cooking, and seasoning choices in foods made by others often seem discordant to me (particularly when I am also eating something Gretchen made).
After Gretchen had eaten most of dinner and had slipped off to talk to others, Amy T. came over and she and I chatted about a number of things. For once I actually had some delicious gossip that she didn't know (it relates to Cody, the former Mercy For Animals employee). Later on, I chatted with Ashley; she and I always have a good time drinking and talking at these things. She asked me at one point what it was she was drinking and I said that I recalled seeing her pouring vodka. I don't have enough of that kind of crazy in my life.
In amongst all the usual things happening at a vegan Thanksgiving, this one couple we know appeared to have formed a relationship with a somewhat younger other couple, and the two couples had, at least for tonight, swapped partners and were being touchy-feely (in a newly-in-love way) through the whole gathering. I referred to them as "the thruple," though of course they were more like a "quadruple." "Thruple" is just such a fun word to say!.
There was a guy at Thanksgiving tonight with a green parrot named Jitterbug, and he and his bird kept nuzzling each other all night. Occasionally the bird would say things that sounded like they might be English words, but I couldn't tell what they were. I was a little worried about the interest being expressed in the parrot by some of the larger dogs, but Jitterbug stayed safe and eventually got to retreat into his solid-looking plexiglass bird cage.
There was so much food leftover at the end of the evening that Erica and Justin had us all take tupperware containers of it home. I'd been drinking red wine all night, so Gretchen had to drive us all the way back to Hurley. I had, however, excercised a fair amount of restraint, and would've been fine to drive once we'd crossed the George Washington to the Jersey side.


Gretchen with Harry the Dog. Erica is holding the wine glass and that guy with Jitterbug the parrot is visible in the background.


For linking purposes this article's URL is:
http://asecular.com/blog.php?181122

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