Thanksgiving Turkeys Are Fighting Mad! But Tasty! They're Better Off Dead! Yum! Let Us Give Thanks!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

Happy Thanksgiving!  Especially to those of you who literally "traveled" yesterday.  I traveled "a fur piece" but observed our Thanksgiving Tradition of watching the Macy's TG Day Parade (in HD) with our morning coffee!  I was flipping through the channels when I stopped on something as educational as it was timely on the Discovery Channel.  "When Turkeys Attack" is as scary and hilarious as it sounds!  And, as an added bonus, we learned about nature!

As it turns out, our traditional Thanksgiving protein is scrappy (at best) alive, more typically the live entrée  is bad-tempered, aggressive and looking to settle a score!  They're spoiling for a fight!   Between heart-stopping videos of befuddled victims, humans, assaulted by talons and beaks, or just being "menaced" (you haven't been stalked, until you've met the business end of an angry gobbler!) turkey "experts" commented on the wiliness, the permanent bad mood turkeys are always in!

Turkeys are descendants of pterodactyls, and they haven't mentally changed much in the passing millennium.  They would definitely eat us if they were big enough, and the fact that they cannot, combined with their inability to fly keeps them mean.  Turkeys are the original "angry birds".

That and they just look better headless and featherless.   They look even better roasting in an oven.  Or in a deep fryer.  Or on the front of a whiskey bottle.. So don't ever lose any sleep (not that you do, I certainly do not) over the millions of turkeys that are the delicious, if fleeting, "guests of honor" on our holiday dinner tables!  Just don't over cook them!  And pass the cranberries!

Ben Franklin had many brilliant ideas but proposing that the turkey be our national bird was not one of them.  I mean have you seen their heads?  And those wattle things, what is going on with those?

The turkey is sneaky, belligerent, bullying and vicious. Nothing very "noble" about a turkey.   In other words, made for American politics!

Hmmm, maybe Franklin was onto something after all...

Drumstick, anyone?

Only Wonderful Things Come From Paris!

Hello Fellow Travelers,

I am going to write something about the recent terror attacks in  Paris.  I'll not recount the perseverance and fortitude of the French people, blah, blah, yes, they undoubtedly will prevail - it has been thoroughly covered and continues to be reported upon.  I mean have you ever spoke with a French person?  They are seriously stoic!  Beyond blase!

Almost nothing surprises them!  Parisians are notoriously fatalistic, "If it was meant to be, it was meant to be.  Que Sera!"  Jean Paul Sartre or Doris Day, I always mix them up!

My point is France and Paris in particular will not only survive Isis, they will continue to inspire the world!  The best wine?  French.  The best food?  Same.  Fashion?  Forget about it!  Art?  Ideas?  Yes and yes!  All France!

You want to know why Parisians always look so bored?  They actually have been there and done "that"!  And they come from the place that transcended whatever "that" is to an art form!  Parisians aren't jaded, they're just exhausted from a lifetime of being in the center of arguably the most beautiful city on Earth.

 Take the cookie, for instance;  The French invented the perfect macaroon: delicately flavored and scented, exquisite in both taste and appearance.   Iridescent perfection! What do we have?  The Double "Stuft" Oreo.  And we're damn happy to have it!

And so what does a senseless massacre a half world away have in common with a brain tumor survivor?  As it turns out, quite a bit!  Cancer is a terrorist, unpredictable and devastating.  I was stalked by cancer!  I was terrorized by it!  However, I lived I've had to adapt a little (OK, a lot, but it's been pretty beneficial) but I'm better than I've ever been.  Like the attacks last week, there are, in fact, survivors.  An entire country of survivors.  The entire world wants to protect Paris!  Chanel is reason enough to track down whomever planned and/or carried out those horrific crimes.

I want to see Paris with my PS.  The French are as inspirational in a gunfire scenario.  I will walk again!  I will stand around a lot!  I like only the best, I survived more than one life-threatening experience, I have felt profoundly attacked since 2011. I complain a lot.  Maybe I am French!  Nah!  I'm way too chipper to be French!

My "Papal" Bobblehead - 3" Tall and Plastic and he STILL has Adventures! Rock On, Your Plastic Holiness!

Hello Fellow Travelers!

A few weeks back I wrote about my very special friend who sent me a very special gift - a Pope Francis bobblehead!  This thing cracked me up!  So I took him to meet the in-laws in Burlingame, he killed at the Italian restaurant and continued to inspire hilarity at a birthday party for my venerable mo-in-law that followed.  The Pope Bobblehead had just the right amount of silly joy to make anyone laugh or at least smile when they saw it.  After careful consideration, I decided to share the joy and pass him onto my oncologist Dr. P., at Mercy General Hospital (he has an office there).  The PS asked why I was sharing a Pope Francis bobblehead with Dr. P., it reminds me a lot of the Pez dispenser that Jerry Seinfeld put on Elaine's leg during a piano recital (it made her laugh).  That's how funny a Pope Francis bobblehead is!

A couple of weeks ago I had to have some "minor" (No such thing) surgery done by my favorite neurosurgeon (Thank you, HA!) at the very same hospital (Dignity?  Hot Diggety!) where this journey began for me, Mercy GH.  I thought I would have plenty of opportunity to drop the "plastic Pontiff" at Dr. P.'s office.

It was not to be!  Not only was I being released, I was being released now!  I entrusted the diminutive Pontiff (in an "official" box) to a wonderful physical therapist who promised to drop him off at the doctor's office.  As I was being led away for yet another test (like the condemned walking "The Green Mile") she and my nurse (Alvin, like the chipmunk) were receiving my final directives.

I should mention that this "minor" procedure took a lot out of me!  I was a hurting unit before I elected to have the round IPhone-shaped satellite taken out of my skull!  Many headaches and hair donts' later, I'm still trying to get over it!

Here is where "Le Pope Plastique's" activities get a little murky.  He was MIA for a few days.  it  Was he inspiring healthcare professionals?  Was he bringing laughter to PT's at Mercy GH?  We'll never know.  I know one thing - it probably wasn't boring, whatever it was.  My recipient used his Sherlock Holmes-like powers of deduction to find "Le Papa du Bobble" and located him (he had been bobbleing for a few days in the PT break room) and took him home to his five-year-old daughter who promptly broke it's bobbing head off.  He's since been fixed.  (Maybe all I need is a little Crazy Glue!  Can't hurt, might help, Just sayin'...)

Why does this toy inspire me to write and walk?  I think it's fairly obvious.  If a little toy, a bobblehead no less, can travel so much and have so many adventures I certainly should be capable of recovery!  That and it's just darned funny!