Thanks Giving
Nov. 26th, 2015 11:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shannon_aToday Kimberly and I did something we've never done for Thanksgiving before: we went out to eat.
Usually, we heat up a prepared meal at home or (more rarely) go to the South Bay and eat with family. But this year I didn't want piles of leftovers in the house for weeks, and K. wasn't up to big family gatherings (though ironically the big family gathering ended up not happening), so we decided to go out and eat instead.
We made reservations at Hs. Lordships down at the Berkeley Marina, and also invited along Kimberly's friend, C. And so we set out a bit before 4pm today to go and eat.
We were seated at a table directly overlooking the Bay. K. and I think it was literally the best table in the restaurant, because we were right at the window and the Golden Gate was pretty much straight out from us. Beautiful view, especially since we got to see the sunset.
The dinner was buffet, and it was quite great. There were tons of different options, and all of them were very good. The plates for the buffet were somewhat small, and that actually encouraged you to take small portions, which gave more room to really enjoy everything.
First plate was cornbread, biscuit, a few pieces of sushi, chilled crab leg, chilled shrimp, cocktail sauce, crab salad, calamari salad.
Second plate was ham, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, cornbread (that's the only thing I went back for), small piece of hard bread, brown mushroom gravy.
Third plate was chocolate cake, cookie that was chocolate dipped, a marshmallow dipped in a chocolate fountain, and a strawberry dipped in a chocolate fountain.
K. was unfortunately feeling sick, so C. and I were sitting around chatting, and I couldn't resist eventually going back for a little more desert. I had a very teeny chocolate cupcake and a slice of some marbled bread or cake or something.
Yeah, I overindulged, but Thanksgiving is pretty much the quintessential American holiday, which means it's all about overindulging. We could only have made it more American if we'd shot some guns, thrown some baseballs, drank some beer, and then thrown it all up.
(There was actually some throwing up at the buffet, but someone who almost made it to the bathroom. What's more American than over-eating, throwing it up, then going back for more?)
K. and I often marathon a TV show on Thanksgiving. The plan was to watch Wolf Hall, which has been on our Tivo since the start of the year. So early this morning we watched the first ep., and I was entranced by the movements of these historical characters (especially Cromwell, who walks around a lot), but K. proclaimed it the most boring hour of TV she'd ever watched. We'll finish it up together, but K. didn't want to watch the whole thing (or most of it) today as planned.
Fortunately, the world now includes streaming. K. recently signed up for a 30-day trial of Amazon Prime, to get Prime shipping on any Christmas presents we order from them. So we also watched one of their newest series, Man in the High Castle, based on the novel (they keep saying "book") by Phillip K. Dick. I remember liking it quite a bit when I went on a Dick binge in the '90s. (Boy, that sounds wrong.) So, I was thrilled to watch the TV show too. We watched 5 eps over the course of the day, which is half the show. Good stuff. Very nice historical (alternate history '60s) feel, good directing, interesting characters, good writing. I need to reread the book to see what they used and what they made up. (Somehow that's the one book that went missing from my Dick collection, so I've ordered a new copy in the "Vintage" edition that almost all of my Dick collection consists of.)
Our Fitbits encourage us to be active, so in the evening we also went for an hour walk, up the hill to near the Claremont and back.
Probably the one way we failed in making this a quintessential American holiday.
We'd hoped to see some Christmas lights, given how early they appear nowadays, but there were almost none out. One lit house we saw was very sad. I described it as something like this: "Yeah, we have a Bay Window, but we'll only put lights on two of the three sides, and one will be blue, and one white, and only one will be blinking ... and it'll look just great." Or as I alternatively described it: "That looks like the sort of half-assed crap we'd do."
Usually, we heat up a prepared meal at home or (more rarely) go to the South Bay and eat with family. But this year I didn't want piles of leftovers in the house for weeks, and K. wasn't up to big family gatherings (though ironically the big family gathering ended up not happening), so we decided to go out and eat instead.
We made reservations at Hs. Lordships down at the Berkeley Marina, and also invited along Kimberly's friend, C. And so we set out a bit before 4pm today to go and eat.
We were seated at a table directly overlooking the Bay. K. and I think it was literally the best table in the restaurant, because we were right at the window and the Golden Gate was pretty much straight out from us. Beautiful view, especially since we got to see the sunset.
The dinner was buffet, and it was quite great. There were tons of different options, and all of them were very good. The plates for the buffet were somewhat small, and that actually encouraged you to take small portions, which gave more room to really enjoy everything.
First plate was cornbread, biscuit, a few pieces of sushi, chilled crab leg, chilled shrimp, cocktail sauce, crab salad, calamari salad.
Second plate was ham, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, cornbread (that's the only thing I went back for), small piece of hard bread, brown mushroom gravy.
Third plate was chocolate cake, cookie that was chocolate dipped, a marshmallow dipped in a chocolate fountain, and a strawberry dipped in a chocolate fountain.
K. was unfortunately feeling sick, so C. and I were sitting around chatting, and I couldn't resist eventually going back for a little more desert. I had a very teeny chocolate cupcake and a slice of some marbled bread or cake or something.
Yeah, I overindulged, but Thanksgiving is pretty much the quintessential American holiday, which means it's all about overindulging. We could only have made it more American if we'd shot some guns, thrown some baseballs, drank some beer, and then thrown it all up.
(There was actually some throwing up at the buffet, but someone who almost made it to the bathroom. What's more American than over-eating, throwing it up, then going back for more?)
K. and I often marathon a TV show on Thanksgiving. The plan was to watch Wolf Hall, which has been on our Tivo since the start of the year. So early this morning we watched the first ep., and I was entranced by the movements of these historical characters (especially Cromwell, who walks around a lot), but K. proclaimed it the most boring hour of TV she'd ever watched. We'll finish it up together, but K. didn't want to watch the whole thing (or most of it) today as planned.
Fortunately, the world now includes streaming. K. recently signed up for a 30-day trial of Amazon Prime, to get Prime shipping on any Christmas presents we order from them. So we also watched one of their newest series, Man in the High Castle, based on the novel (they keep saying "book") by Phillip K. Dick. I remember liking it quite a bit when I went on a Dick binge in the '90s. (Boy, that sounds wrong.) So, I was thrilled to watch the TV show too. We watched 5 eps over the course of the day, which is half the show. Good stuff. Very nice historical (alternate history '60s) feel, good directing, interesting characters, good writing. I need to reread the book to see what they used and what they made up. (Somehow that's the one book that went missing from my Dick collection, so I've ordered a new copy in the "Vintage" edition that almost all of my Dick collection consists of.)
Our Fitbits encourage us to be active, so in the evening we also went for an hour walk, up the hill to near the Claremont and back.
Probably the one way we failed in making this a quintessential American holiday.
We'd hoped to see some Christmas lights, given how early they appear nowadays, but there were almost none out. One lit house we saw was very sad. I described it as something like this: "Yeah, we have a Bay Window, but we'll only put lights on two of the three sides, and one will be blue, and one white, and only one will be blinking ... and it'll look just great." Or as I alternatively described it: "That looks like the sort of half-assed crap we'd do."