Food Glorious Food (plus: Epilogue to the Terrorist Panini)

Thanksgiving with my family is all about the food. It is my favorite meal of the year, no matter what kind of fancy restaurants I frequent between Novembers. We generally have between 15-35 people - this year it was 27. A large percentage of the adults are in some way, shape, or form in the food business - be it as restaurant owner, meat and seafood purveyor, pastry chef - you get the idea.

( This year's menu, for those who care. )

And as a wah-wah punchline for the driver's license story - when I got home, I got online at the Illinois DMV to try to renew my license through the website - entered my DL number, and came up "your driver's license is current through 2005."

There's this thing in Illinois where, if you're a good driver with a clean record, you can auto-renew through the mails and they send you a sticker which goes on the back of the license with all the pertinent info - donor ID, birth date, etc. - and lo and behold, I flipped over my license and there it was. Current through 2005. Just like the website said.

Just think - if the gate agent had flipped over the license, I never would have had the Terrorist Panini story. And what a loss to modern folklore that would have been.

Hate Me, Hate My West Wing Fetish

I should probably craft an essay about the supra-subplot of Aaron Sorkin being unable to get over it, but instead I'll just point out elynross' comments, the great essay over at flummery, and my response to elynross.