Category Archives: Family

Thanksgiving Post – A Recap AKA How to Not Cook a Turkey

As I told you, The Hubs and I bought this super-fancy infrared turkey fryer to cook a big 20lb bird for Thanksgiving. Long story short, it’s an awfully good thing that my mom cooked a turkey too, because the whole turkey fryer thing was a bit of a debacle. Here is a nice little story in pictures that will tell you all about it.

cleaning out the cavity
cleaning out the cavity

Touching raw meat is seriously creepy, and to prepare a store-bought turkey you have to clean the whole thing out…which means handling it.  Running the water up into the “cavity” of the bird was a little traumatic for me.  Probably even more traumatic for the boidy.

To make the boidy taste good, you have to use the spices
To make the boidy taste good, you have to use the spices
rubbed and spiced up...and still seriously creepy
rubbed and spiced up...and still seriously creepy
really?
really?
tg6
mostly assembled pieces...sha.
other pieces that are not much assembled
other pieces that are not much assembled
checking back with the instructions
checking back with the instructions
tg9
lucky I had help! Turkey cooker is assembled!

turkey in the cooker.  but that's not the end of the story...
turkey in the cooker. but that's not the end of the story...

There are no “after” pictures and I’ll tell you why.  The turkey took FOREVER to cook.  By the time dinner was over it was pitch black outside.  So dark, in fact, that we couldn’t read the meat thermometer while it was still stuck into the turkey.  So, we pulled out the thermometer and RAN over to the light to see if it was where it was supposed to be.  It was one degree off.  So, we picked up the turkey fryer, placed it into the bed of Hubs’s truck, carried it into the house, and then attempted to get the thing out of the inner cage.

Or, I should say, I attempted to get the thing out.  The little wings and legs were sticking out all willy nilly and I darn near sent the thing sliding across the room a few times.  I finally got it carved and onto a plate.

So then what happened?  How did it taste?  Good questions, all.  Nobody would eat it.  Because the meat thermometer had a dubious reading, and because the turkey rode open-aired in the back of the truck nobody would touch it.  I tasted a bit, and it was good, but it was a total waste of a 20 lb turkey.  So sad, I know.  It does help that the turkey was a gift.

At one point during the whole ordeal I was upset and ranting at The Hubs and accidentally pronounced “turkey” as “tourkey.”  That has been the takeaway from the experience.  I don’t think The Hubs has pronounced “turkey” regularly since then.

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T Minus Turkey

does this picture creep you out as much as it creeps me out?
does this picture creep you out as much as it creeps me out?

So, yesterdayDwight and I bought an infra-red turkey “fryer.”  It’s supposed to give you the same results as a traditional turkey fryer that you fill with oil, drop the turkey in, etcetera, but you don’t need oil, and it reportedly will not shoot the turkey eleventy hundred feet into the air, spraying hot oil all over the neighborhood pets.

The problem is that it is a 16 lb-capacity turkey “fryer” and the turkey that Jeff Dear bought for us is a twenty-pounder.  Undeterred, around noon today I will attempt to clean said turkey, and stuff it into the inadequately-sized turkey “fryer.”  Provided it doesn’t send my Dad into fits, I will attempt to record the progress with photographs.  Stay tuned, and Happy Turkey Day to all you gorgeous people.

creepy photo by atomicshark

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So Angry

I know I normally shy away from ultra-personal things on the internet, but there is something I feel like I have to get out. In April my dad lost his job. Since then he has gone on many job interviews trying to find a new job that will make as much money as his old one. My parents are not in a financial place to retire just yet, and it’s pretty important that my dad finds steady work quickly. He’s got a contracting gig right now, and we’re hoping that holds out until they offer him a full time gig, but he has been actively seeking jobs elsewhere since his boss says he can’t promise anything just yet.

Dad had a line on a job with a company called Luck Stone. They ended up giving the Richmond-area job (my dad lives in Richmond) to an internal candidate from Fredricksburg. They called him back because THAT job was open (yeah, I know, logic?) and had him interview for that one.

Back up, though. For that first job? The HR recruiter was horribly unresponsive and told him she’d call and then didn’t, and really made him sweat it out, only to find out that he didn’t get the job. He complained to his friend at the company, because that’s just not right. It’s fine to not hire him, but don’t string him along and be unresponsive and make somebody sweat it out like that.

So this time around, he goes through the five hour interview, and this time she calls him when she said she would, and this is how she starts the phone call: “Well, I have good news and bad news.”

Then she proceeded to say “The good news is that we had four very qualified candidates. The bad news is that you weren’t chosen for the position.”

Take a moment. Put yourself in my dad’s shoes. Someone knows that you’re really in need of a job. And they start a phone call like THAT? That was cruel, and mean, and heartless and I feel so impotent. I can’t do anything to make my dad feel better that he still doesn’t have a full time permanent job, and I can’t do anything to make it so that that HR person doesn’t ever treat anyone like she treated my dad. Because apparently she’s allowed to act however she wants. Dad said she was practically singsong in her delivery.

I guess I could write an open letter to the owner of the company, but given that for a short time I intercepted open letters to the CEO of MY company…actually…

You know what? When someone writes a letter to the CEO of my company we respond. I mean, the CEO doesn’t always respond, but we route the letter to the appropriate person and action is taken. That’s what I’m going to do. I doubt a lot that this Luck Stone company has the integrity and morals that the company I work for does, but they have to at least have some guidelines in place for their treatment of people. Yeah. I’ll let you know what happens. In the meantime. If you pray, pray for my family. If you don’t, then keep your fingers crossed, because we need all the luck we can get.