Hanging Out In Allentown

For the past few Thanksgivings, and this one is no exception, I’ve gone up to Allentown from my home in South Philadelphia to spend the holiday with my closest friend. Now, she doesn’t want me to mention her by name, so I’ll call her…..ummmm……Cupcake.

I’ve known Cupcake for about 15 years, and we get together several times a year to hang out. The Thanksgiving hang-outs have been going on for about 4 years. With my family (Mom and Dad) living in Maine, it’s rare that I get up there for holidays, so I spend them with Cupcake and her family in Allentown.

Cupcake is a first-grade teacher who is so awesome that she comes down to Philly to pick my no-car ass up whenever we set aside days to hang out. She picked me up after work yesterday (Tuesday), and will be dropping me off at work Monday morning. How cool is that???

Today, while she was educating America’s first-grade youth, I was busy shopping at Wegman's picking up the stuff that would be assembled into our contributions for the Thanksgiving dinner we’ll be attending tomorrow with her family, at her sister and brother-in-laws. What, you ask, will be our contributions?

Well, to start with, we’re bringing tortellini salad. Not store bought brand, but tortellini salad we’ve made. And I’d like to add…the BEST tortellini salad you could ever have.

We’re also bringing homemade onion soup. Onion soup, for Thanksgiving, you ask? Well, not a traditional part of the American tradition, but a favorite of mine. And the soup will be served in the hollowed-out onions that provide the main component of the soup. I’ve made this one time in the past, and it turned out great. This seemed like the perfect time to pull this out again for some other people to try. We’ll see how it goes over tomorrow.

And the final thing we’re bringing for dinner tomorrow is a green salad. Easy to assemble, and loved by all.

As of Wednesday night, the tortellini salad has been made, and the soup has been made. The salad will be put together tomorrow before we head over to join the rest of Cupcake’s family for this annual gathering and giving of thanks.

I can’t wait to stuff my face, and lay around all day watching football. To that, I give thanks! (Cupcake is NOT into the football part of the day, but she’ll get by okay. Heh heh heh)

One additional great aspect of this year’s Thanksgiving is my best bud is coming back to Bethlehem, PA (the next town North of Allentown) to visit his family, so we (Cupcake and I) will be getting together with him Friday night to down some beers and hang out. I don’t know if he wants his name plastered on my blog so I’ll call him…..Judgement.

Then on Saturday, Judgement and I will be getting a round of disc golf in at Jordan Creek Park Disc Golf Course here in Allentown, the course where both Judgement and I learned the sport, and where we met, back in 1994.

Gotta go for now though…there’s some tortellini salad that I need to check just ONE MORE TIME to make sure it’s perfect.

So, to all of you reading this, I hope you have a great Thanksgiving holiday in the United States. If you’re reading this from outside the US, I hope that your country’s day of observance, whenever it is held, is also great, and full of food, sports, and suds!

**burp**