God Bless America

American Thanksgiving, for the most, is about over-remembered and disingenuous expectations. And gravy. Because a well-honed gravy can cover up the driest, over-cooked, blandest factory-farmed 30 lb mutant 'bird' that no one eats any other day of the year and a whole slew of incredibly bad side dishes. Mashes potatoes get a pass, because, well, they're mashed. And they're potatoes. Holiday benefits include jello-ed Auntie recipes and raised-from-the-dead family squabbles that erupt from clinical-idiot-barely-connected-DNA-strands who've had two glasses of box wine remembering insignificant slights from Thanksgivings/Christmas'/birthdays/funerals from the past. Bad TV football provides cover for those unwilling to stare the horror of it all in the face. And then there is the shopping. Thanksgiving night waiting in your lawn chair outside of DoucheMart eagerly anticipating the trampling of your fellow Holiday shoppers for this year's IT gift. But a really good gravy done properly, drippings, scraping the fond, adjusting the seasoning, splashing in some wine or vermouth or cognac, can smooth over much that is a traditional American Thanksgiving. Pies can be tasty as well.

Here we go...

It's best to start out a spanking new venture with a spectacular musical Celebration of Life. Ladies and Gentlemen. Portland, Oregon's fabulous rising star, Storm Large.