Thanksgiving.

This was the first year, I think, that I haven't spent Thanksgiving with my parents being involved. And coincidentally (not as a result of), it was actually pretty ok.

Mike's mom has a cousin near Seattle, so Diana, Mike, Gwen and I drove out and met up with them at their house. That cousin is about my parents age, and lives there with her husband. Also joining us were their three children (more or less my age), a couple of associated spouses and friends, and a few other random relatives. In spite of them not knowing us (except Mike) very well, they were extremely hospitable and friendly and welcomed us with open arms.

The husband was retired, and quite interested in woodworking and home-fixer-upping. They'd done some really incredible things to their house, including digging out and replacing the foundation, basically adding a basement with a bedroom and woodshop and stuff. He offered to show Diana, Gwen and I around the woodshop, which we accepted. He went into some pretty substantial detail about all his tools and machines and stuff, and I knew about 5 minutes into it that there was no way of cutting off what looked to be a 45 minute tour. Mick came into the room at some point, and it was funny to watch his _expression go from a vague concern ("Hrm, are they in here?") to a big smile and eye-roll of "Oh no… I've seen this before." It was pretty funny.

We spent a lot of time hanging out with the "kids". Heidi was an attractive, blonde, cute little thing who looked fashionable and like she knew her way around a mall. She was there with her husband Marcus, who was a hulking big football player looking guy. Both were extrememly nice. I joined them both in a rousing game of Yahtzee with a distant 11 year old cousin. Good times.

Justin was her brother, who I didn't talk to or spend much time with. Looked like a pretty tough guy, but was uniformly nice and friendly.

Heath was the third sibling, and was an absolute crack-up. Somewhere in his life he must have visualized the persona he wanted to have, and has since fully adopted it. That persona was sort of a neo-Victorian, Great Gatsby'ish thing with a smattering of Goth/Vampire flavor thrown in. He spoke with a little bit of an accent, and used phrases like "Oh, quite good form, old boy!" and "I'm completely parched. I think I shall go exercise the ladle some." He wore a tailored, Victorian-looking formal outfit. He was really fun to be around (either in spite of this, or because of this, I'm still not sure). He loved to tell stories, and had good ones to share, and generally kept the party fun and flowing. And he made a great punch-bowl of mojito's (a sugary rum drink I'd never had) which kept things lively.

The dinner was fabulous. Very familiar to what my own family would have had, and we ate our fill and departed after many thank you's and goodbyes, satisfied in both body and spirit.

Friday, as I said, we got up and out early.

Saturday was mostly errands and cleaning up around the house. I picked up a copy of my beloved World of Warcraft, and was able to put in a few hours that night. We also hung out with Iwan and Sara and Eryn at Iwans house, which was lots of fun. I played some GTA:SA over there, and it really sucked me in, even though I was sort of blowing over the cutscenes and stuff. The progression and constant questing actually reminded me of WoW in many regards.

Sunday, Diana and I watched the Charger game together. What a great game that was. Diana actually sat and watched most of it with me, and was into it in spite of not really being a football fan. I enjoyed that. We took a nice walk, and watched the Survivor we'd missed, thanks to Iwan and Sara for taping it!

And now, back to work. Things seem to be about the same as I left. Problems are being fixed nearly as quickly as they come up, which is good. I've been booted off the chess ladder due to my extended absence, but should be reinstated soon. I've compared notes with my WoW boys about stuff. Good times.

Oh, I played a great chess game this weekend on Yahoo, too. So good that I thought I should save it. Check it out! (I'm white, and won via forfeit)