It's been noted that (US) Thanksgiving matches up with the beginning of Hanukkah this year. Some people think I'm Jewish, with the "Schwartz" name and all, but nope.

Just had a birthday the day before Thanksgiving (this year) - I'm 42. Celebrated by going out to a movie and dinner. Saw "Frozen" (hey, major Disney film opening on an animation buff's birthday - can't pass that up. Nice, enjoyable, and pretty film as 'Disney Princess' movie musicals go, and it throws enough curve balls that you shouldn't feel like you predicted the whole story ten minutes in. The Mickey Mouse short that precedes the film was a lot of fun and extremely visually clever as well. Fur After Dark dot com is also having a birthday - it's nine. I'm looking forward to the tenth anniversary, assuming economy and piracy doesn't bury us before then.

Thanksgiving itself (AKA the pre-Black-Friday-five-day-weekend carbo-load) was pretty durn good. I did the cooking for my dad and the visiting Shou Lung. I was prepared this year and things went more or less smoothly, though I misinterpreted part of a recipe and used the wrong kind/amount of pepper, resulting in a very spicy green bean casserole (not bad actually) Props to Shou for preparing the sweet potato dish using only a masher.

Best to you and yours this season.