This is a song about Alice....

[tzikeh]

I am currently engaging in the annual Thanksgiving tradition at my parents' house--listening to all twenty-two minutes of "Alice's Restaurant" and singing along. This is one of the few things my father and I can do together that doesn't end with him shouting for twenty minutes and me bursting into tears, so it's a relatively joyful thing for me. We both know every single word, and enjoy the hell of it.

So here are some things I'm thankful for.

• Alice
  
• Shovels and rakes and implements of destruction
  
• A Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat
  
• Officer Obie
  
• The red VW microbus
  
• Twenty-seven eight-by-ten colour glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us
  
• A song about Alice
  
• Another Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat
  
• American blind justice
  
• Room 604
  
• The hairy eyeball
  
• The Group W bench
  
• A study in black and white of my fingerprints
  
• Alice's Restaurant!

Here is the single greatest blog post ever made about this song.

Other things I'm thankful for:

• My friends
  
• Technology (especially the kind that brings me a few new friends every year)
  
• Modern medicine
  
• Steampunk (honest to Flying Spaghetti Monter--if Steampunk had existed when I was in high school, I would have been all over it, and I would still be all over it today)
  
• Nerdfighters (HOO-AH!)
  
• The Occupy movement, which gives me the first glimmer of hope I've had in a very long time that this country is not well and truly finished.

Lastly: My Family's Annual Thanksgiving Dinner That Can't Be Beat. There are twenty-two people this year (we usually have more). Great-uncle Eddie is a gourmet chef; second-cousin Patricia is a pastry chef at one of the high-end restaurants in D.C. (the name of which I can never remember); my father is a meat purveyor for a large number of the top restaurants in Manhattan.


The Appetizers

• Four or varieties of cheeses, five varieties of crackers and bread
  
• Grape tomato-raw cauliflower-kalamata olives mix
  
• Various vegetable and paste-topped crudités
  
• Jonah crab claws with cocktail sauce
  
• Stone crab claws with honey-mustard-horseradish sauce (one small bowl without horseradish)
  
• A variety of appetizer wines
  
• Hot apple cider (virgin or spiked)
  
• Irish coffee or Irish hot chocolate (or virgin hot chocolate for the kids and those who prefer not to drink alcohol this early in the evening [or at all])

The Main Courses

• Two turkeys
  
• One honey-glazed ham
  
• One tender brisket
  
• Broccoli sautéed in garlic
  
• Root vegetables roasted in cream sauce
  
• Three different vegetarian dishes (I can't be bothered to remember what they are because I never eat them)
  
• Stewed fruit (om nom nom)
  
• A large baking dish of yams (known in my family as "yums") covered in large marshmallows which are cut in half and placed end-up in the yams so that they toast in the oven
  
• Gravies: one beef and one vegetarian
  
• Cranberry sauces: the cylindrical kind from the can and the berry kind
  
• Two varieties of chutney
  
• Homemade bread with sweet-cream butter
  
• A variety of dinner wines (red, white, sparkling white)

The Desserts

• Homemade apple pie
  
• Homemade mince pie
  
• Homemade flourless chocolate cake
  
• Homemade cream puffs
  
• Homemade Small individual fruit and sponge-cake parfaits
  
• Candied fruits and fruit peels (store-bought; THE HORROR... THE HORROR....)
  
• Homemade triple-layer chocolate cake with butter-cream between the layers, chocolate ganache surrounding the cake, and raspberry brandy sauce
  
• Homemade coconut-banana disgusting (Okay, this was originally called coconut-banana custard pie, but after a few years of noticing that family members would slice the pie, eat the filling, and leave the crust, my nana decided to just make the filling and put it in a large bowl with two serving spoons. It's whipped banana custard, toasted coconut shavings and sliced bananas on top. Sometimes the custard is flavored with rum.)
  
• Dessert liqueurs and other standard liquor
  
• The Best Coffee Ever
  
• The annual debate about Original Green Death NyQuil vs. Pathetic Cherry-"flavored" NyQuil (I swear to you that I am not making this up)

I hope that everyone who celebrates has a lovely Turkey day, and that all of you who don't, worldwide, have a great day however you choose to spend it.

Comments

[klia]

Is the NyQuil debate before or after everyone goes comatose? :D

<3 <3 <3

[tzikeh]

The NyQuil debate has no schedule. The NyQuil debate is a rebel, baby.

[klia]

Hee!

[kass]

Alice's Restaurant!!! <3

This is a song about Alice....

[tzikeh]

Alice's Restaurant!!! <3

There is an illustrated version (in two parts) from YouTube at this tumblr post.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

[thaccian]

And you can add to your "stations that play Alice" list: KZPS 92.5 FM on which I had the good fortune to listen to "a song about Alice" at two different times today. Once while driving to the afternoon T-day dinner at my cousin's, and once again this evening while driving to the ranch for tomorrow's extended family, extended T-day dinner celebration.

The first time I was in a car with others who do not know about Alice and were too busy chatting to listen in, but this evening I was in the car alone, flying down the highway and singing with the volume cranked way up and singing along just as loudly.

This holiday has many not so happy associations for me, but the annual singing about Alice is always a high point. So YAY!

[tzikeh]

I had the good fortune to listen to "a song about Alice" at two different times today.

You gotta see these!