Happy Thanksgiving and Look in Your Trunk

Thanksgiving was its usual Fun Self in Shmorange County. There are babies and little kids and the kids that were little yesterday are now men, and the men who were younger are now older and the guys who were older are becoming decrepit.

But not quite. Three sets of brothers got to play basketball yesterday in the park. Plottie and his brother Schmeckl, Nefnik and his brother Dominant and David and his brother Alex. Everything changes and nothing changes, except that David is now huge and Alex is going to be.



The Little Bear's house is still the perfect turkey carving house. Plottie carved one of the two turkeys, as always, but his cousin Cindy has moved into official Second Carver position, meaning her previous job as Turkey Kibbitzer, the job Plotnik occupied until he moved into the Carver slot previously occupied by Harry the Chief, is currently unoccupied. Cousin Michael was supposed to do the job but he appears to prefer playing with his baby nieces more, so an opening remains for someone who can stand next to both carvers, steal slices of turkey while barely keeping his or her fat little fingers from getting sliced off, make inane little comments and generally be a fingernail on the blackboard of life and one of life's great nuisances. With luck, the position will never be filled.

Life does go on. There's a new wrinkle every year, and people have troubles and joys and people come and go, but Thanksgiving at Ric and Paula's house seems eternal, at least as eternal as any of us can predict.

On the way down to Orange County yesterday Mummy P. informed Plot and Duck that she had no spare tire, because the company that had fixed their flat tire had made off with her spare. It made no sense, but plans were made to buy a tire today. This morning Plot looked in the trunk: tire.

So that's the guide phrase for today: Before you decide someone has taken your spare tire, look in your trunk.