where have all the children (and leftovers) gone?

I'm having Thanksgiving withdrawal. The leftovers have pretty much all been eaten; there's one slice of pie left and some homemade cranberry sauce, but nothing else. I'm craving lantulaatikko, the Scandinavian rutabaga Christmas dish, and drunken beans (the way we do it, the green beans are cooked in Ketel One with lots of salt and pepper and an onion). These are things we eat only on Thanksgiving and Christmas, but I want them NOW. Would it destroy their specialness if I made them for dinner tonight?

The children are back at their respective schools. Lola was shocked last night to hear of her imminent return to school; evidently she imagined she was off until Christmas. It's lonely with only my weird little African grey parrot, who mixed up her normal cawing like crows, meowing like cats, and constant shouting of "Step up!" (her one tried-and-true English phrase) with a perfectly-enunciated "Whatever!" this morning. Her "whatever!" was delightfully dismissive, obviously modeled after cynical tween Iris uber Alles, and I wished Iris and Lola had been here to hear it.

This fall I've been on a health kick, eating lightly and exercising heavily. The heavy exercise fell by the wayside the week before Thanksgiving, which was the second week I had the flu. The first week of the flu, I insisted on working out every single time I felt halfway decent, but I noticed that the next day I'd be feverish and miserable again. The second week, I decided to try rest. It's not clear whether either of those strategies helped, keeping fit or resting, but eventually the flu faded away, leaving me free to return to my rigorous exercise schedule, but my healthy eating regime was felled by the Thanksgiving fabulosity and a round of parties.

So how healthy was my Thanksgiving?

Slices of pie eaten: only 2, but each with lots of fresh whipped cream

Exercise over Thanksgiving weekend: strong, hard workouts on 3 days; milder exercise one other day (we took the children on a hike up Mt. Davidson. Iris complained strenuously all the way. "This is unfair!" she shouted, while I thought to myself, "What is unfair is that I am trying to drag my hangover up this steep hill and I have to listen to yer friggin' whining all the way"). One day of absolutely no exercise (Thanksgiving itself).

Cocktail parties attended: two

Hangovers: two (but one was so mild as to be barely noticeable)

Black Friday shopping done: NONE! YES! I hate crowds and crazed commercialism!

Number of pomegranate margaritas drunk on Thanksgiving Day itself: unclear, but definitely more than my share of the pitcher.

Days of overeating: two, but it could have been a lot worse.

I'm afraid to weigh myself. I lost thirty pounds this fall, and it's going to devastate me if much of it sneaked back on. Sigh. It's good for my healthy regime to have Thanksgiving over, but there's no denying that it was delightful and no one really wanted it to end. Even the children got along for the most part, except for one terrible evening when a convenience store owner gave Lola a free Toblerone because she is so damn cute. Sibling rivalry caused horrible, heartfelt tears to flow as some children never get Toblerones from strangers due to cuteness, and the tears weren't even eased by the kindness of the cute child generously turning over a full half of the Toblerone to the unchocolated sibling.

Onward, towards Christmas.