Excellent New Turkey Recipe

The thing about cooking a turkey is that it's essentially REAL simple. Turn the oven on. Take the bag o' innards out of the turkey. Put the turkey in the oven. Wait a while. Eat it. Try not to let the cook know how dry it is.

Given this, I'm always impressed with great! new! ways! to cook your Thanksgiving turkey! because they're hard to invent.

It's possible, though. I knew of a recipe once that involved coating the turkey with some sort of egg paste, which then burnt black and got peeled off, supposedly revealing juicy delightful turkey meat underneath. I never tried it. And then there was the turkey frying craze of a few years ago, on account of which apparently several American garages got burnt down, which at least gave everybody something to talk about, though if you didn't burn the house down, it's true the turkey was pretty edible.

So I'm happy to report to you an excellent new recipe invented by my brother Jim. He explained it to me, but I didn't write it down, so I might get it wrong, for which I'm very sorry. But it produced EXCELLENT turkey, very moist, tasty, and juicy, and nobody died from it and the house didn't burn down. I think that's as good as it gets, on American Thanksgiving.

Jim's Turkey, Thanksgiving 2007

First, break your oven, so that you don't know what the temperature is. (If it's already broken, all the better.) Preheat the oven -- since you don't really know what its temperature is, it hardly matters what you set it on, though I gather you want it HOT.

Then, worry about whether it's too hot, and put an oven thermometer in. (Make sure it's a broken oven thermometer, though, or the next step won't work.)

Next, discover that the oven thermometer you've put in the broken oven is also broken. Go out and attempt to buy a new one. (It's American Thanksgiving, remember; if you're in America, this is going to take a while, cause nearly all the stores are closed.)

Come home to discover that the house is very smoky, on account of something is burning in the oven. Turn the oven off.

Take the turkey out. Its little plastic temperature gauge will have popped up; this is good, cause those things never work, having been created broken. Leave the turkey on the counter and worry about it -- it's nice and brown, and the plastic gauge says it's done, but IS it done? REALLY?

When your sister gets there, ask her how to tell if the turkey is done. She (if she's me) will tell you that the plastic temperature gauge is useless, and you can try wriggling one of the legs, but really you need to cut into the turkey near the bone to see if it's still pink.

Discover that the turkey is not done. Turn the oven back on, this time at an even lower fake temperature (we still couldn't read the temperature, you understand), and cook the turkey some more. Test it every once in a while. When it's finally done, eat it.

What I like about this recipe is that it's so true to life. We're not the Betty Crocker Oven Bakers over here. You could follow this recipe with a wood stove as well as a broken electric one. It's very versatile.

How this broken oven trick will work with the later mandated Christmas cookies, though, I can't say. Perhaps Jim will try it and tell us how things turn out.

Here's Rhys

Rhys, having had all his shots, is now cleared for Dog Park Visits. We're pleased; he's kind to small dogs, fearless with big dogs. He barks all the time, sure, but that's on account of the necessity to herd all moving things. He can't keep up with the big dogs, on account of his youth and his short little legs, but he loves to chase after them; this also is "herding." They don't notice, so they don't mind. When they play with him, they roll him over and over like a barrel.

Someday I'd like to take him out to a Corgi convention, so that he can play with lots of other dogs just his size, and just as determined to herd the universe.

Official Pagan Holidays

The Wild Hunt reports that one of Britain's government sections, the Department for Children, Schools, and Families, has instituted a new holiday system; their civil workers may take "bank holidays" according to their own choice, by swapping -- they can work on Christmas, for instance, and take Samhain off. Other departments are expected to follow, in the move to adopt an official post-Christain calendar.

Fair. Fair and good.

Thoughts on the Sabbatical. Or BBC America. Whatever.

I really like being on sabbatical. I like it lots. I do believe that what really would suit me would be a perpetual sabbatical. That would be great. Then I could spend all my time sitting around looking out the window having Great Thoughts (which is my case at the moment has to do with The Theatre, yes you may be jealous if you like), whilst BBC America blithered in the background.

At the moment we're on "Cash in the Attic," a lovely show in which the presenters show up at your house, because you have invited them, and then find stuff you've put in boxes and left conveniently lying around. Jonty, the antiques specialist, wanders through your house and then tells you that your porcelain leaping trout is truly amazing and worth at least 40 GBP. I like especially the way the spontaneity is completely unconvincing. It's so clear that everybody gets all their stuff out for Jonty to find. Do you really want him looking through the bedroom drawers? I think not.

Then you all go to the auction house and auction off your crap and get money for your project, such as building a greenhouse, publishing a children's book for your grandkids, or buying a ramp for the house so your wheelchair bound spouse can get in and out the door. It's all very meaningful.

Later, my Favorite Show will come on, which is "How Clean is Your House?" the answer to which is not very, or the show wouldn't be visiting you. You can ask Kim and Aggie to come to your house, or, more likely, your friends and family can turn you in, and then Kim and Aggie come and shriek about the dead flies in your sink and the cat turds all over the living room floor, and they take swabs and send them off to the laboratory so as to prove to you that you're going to die from filth if you don't start cleaning your house, and then they clean it all up all sparkling, whilst giving you handy tips about how to clean your bathtub with lemon juice, and then they come back two weeks later to find out if you've changed your evil ways.

Now that I write this all out, I can see that one of the charms this show has for me has not to do with my present -- my apartment is fairly tidy these days, and I don't need Kim and Aggie, thank you very much -- but with the past. I have been, in my time, BOTH a professional housecleaner, whose specialty was cleaning up the sort of house that Kim and Aggie seek out, AND a regular humor columnist for what was then the Reclaiming Newsletter -- under the guise of "Hannah Clancy," I wrote a fake housekeeping column for many years, in which I advised readers to do such things as throw glitter on the dust to hide it. We got a letter once from a reader in Germany, who informed us in a serious tone (though god knows the letter itself might have been a joke -- one can hope) that Hannah was doing her readers a disservice in advising them to clean their bathtubs with sandblasters.

Some of the bathtubs I've seen on "How Clean is Your House?" could have done with some sandblasting.

I won't get to see them today, though, cause I have to actually go into work, on account of having a meeting.

If I'm asked how the sabbatical is going, the answer is great! going well! getting lots done!

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

And my house is clean.

Ceiling Cat iz mai sheprd

How, devoted LOLCat follower that I am, did I miss the LOLCat Bible?* Thank Goddess I know now where it is, so that I may bookmark it and read it often, perhaps every morning, so as to start my day off right, in a spiritual fashion, in tune with the good vibrations of the source of all goodness -- i.e., Ceiling Cat -- and his coequal cohorts, Hover Cat and Jesus (who once said, as you'll remember, "Doggehs haz sofas, burdiez haz nests, but see? Invisible bed 4 meh!"

Life is good.

There's lots left to translate, if you want to get in on the project. In the meantime, here, for your delectation, is Psalm 23:

1. Ceiling Cat iz mai sheprd (which is funni if u knowz teh joek about herdin catz LOL.) He givz me evrithin I need.
2. He letz me sleeps in teh sunni spot an haz liek nice waterz r ovar thar.
3. He makez mai soul happi an maeks sure I go teh riet wai for him. Liek thru teh cat flap insted of out teh opin windo LOL.
4. I iz in teh valli of dogz, fearin no pooch, bcz Ceiling Cat iz besied me rubbin' mah ears, an it maek me so kumfy.
5. He letz me sit at teh taebl evn when peepl who duzint liek me iz watchn. He givz me a flea baff an so much gooshy fud it runz out of mai bowl LOL.
6. Niec things an luck wil chase me evrydai an I wil liv in teh Ceiling Cats houz forevr.

Don't miss the Book of Job, by the way. Srsly.
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*Thanks to fishing for water for the link!

Dog Story Redux; All Is Well

The upshot of the sad dog story below is that over in the dining room of my new apartment is a Welsh Cardigan Corgi* puppy, 4 months old, who is quietly and happily tearing apart his stuffed sheep.

We still miss the dogs we had to send back, but we do dearly love Rhys**. He's focused, and intense, and hilarious. He loves his training sessions. He was housetrained, pretty much, within a week after he arrived; he was crate trained immediately. He's cute. He's loving. He fits in the apartment.

The only real problem we had is that the Corgis are cattle dogs. They don't herd people by butting up against them and trying to shoulder them into the kitchen. They herd people by biting their ankles and/or standing stock still in front of them and barking incessantly. The barking is tolerable; the ripping up our clothes and ankles is not.

When we went to the first puppy kindergarten class, I saw how deeply ingrained this behavior is; he spent the entire "free play time" herding the other little puppies, running flat out in a semi-circle around them, getting them to stay together, much to their confusion. I have never before or since seen him so completely joyful, and so completely energized.

We were given lots of advice. First: yelp when he bites, so that he knows he needs to bite more softly (this being the method used by the puppy's littermates). This method worked very well for all the pieces of our bodies that weren't our ankles; it did NOT work for our ankles, which he would then bite more fiercely and bark at. Our ankles weren't pieces of our bodies, you see. They were pieces of recalcitrant cows.

Second: distract the puppy's attention with a chew toy. This method might well work for other dogs. Pomeranians, maybe. Cardigan Corgis, I don't think so. Again. More biting, more barking.

Third: Yelp and leave the room. Well, perhaps this would have worked if leaving the room didn't include more biting and barking.

I thought up a training method of my own, which was that I kept dog kibble in my pocket, and whenever Rhys went for my ankles, I said "stop!" and if he did, and didn't then bark at me (since the biting and the barkiing are both herding activities and connected), he got a treat. Or, if I walked by him and I saw him THINK about going for my heels, and he didn't, he got a treat. I practiced this activity, whenever he started herding me, by walking back and forth through the room and giving him treats whenever he didn't go for my ankles or start barking.

This was a brilliant training method, except it didn't work. He would stop for a bit, and then later start in again, only worse.

One day I hit the wall, and said to him, "time out," and took him and put him upstairs in the crate he sleeps in (I did this cheerfully, since the crate's not for punishment). In a few minutes I took him out. He went for my heels again. I put him in time out. We did this five times. He stopped going for my heels.

The next day the child came over, and when Rhys started herding him, we started the time out procedure. He stopped.

The next day Laura came by, and he herded her; we started time out, and he stopped.

The next day when the child was here Rhys started standing in front of us barking; I said, "Rhys, do you need time out?" and he went and lay down on his dog pillow.

And ever since then, he's fine.

Sometimes when he's really tired, he'll start herding us again; we put him in the crate, and he goes to sleep.

He's also figured out that when he's really frustrated with us, he can "pretend herd," by getting his teeth around his stuffed sheep, and then butting our ankles with his nose. This is fine by me, cause it lets him tell us what he wants to tell us, without breaking either our ankles or our eardrums.

I enjoy this dog a lot. Lots of brains. Highly trainable. Very devoted to his people. Really worth the energy and time.
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*That is, a Welsh Corgi, but not the kind the Queen owns. Both breeds were bred for cattle and sheep herding in Wales, but on two different sides of a mountain range. There's been some interbreeding, and they have some characteristics in common, but they have different ancestries.

**Spelled "Reese" in English, it means "exuberant." Yep.