The First Thanksgiving

Another Thanksgiving holiday has come and gone and as I reflect on this most recent four day weekend, I can’t help but think how truly thankful I am at how everyone has held true to the reason for the holiday. I can just imagine how the original settlers celebrated this joyous event.

Back in 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed from Italy in search of anything important enough to give him his own holiday but he was really hoping to reach America where the kids would learn poems about his sailing prowess and plague-giving abilities. Somewhere along the way he got lost and landed on the shores of India or Ireland or some place like that. Regardless, he screwed up, which left America, as it was already being called in all the travel brochures, wide open for the Pilgrims.

Now the Pilgrims, aptly named for their crappy attitudes and solemn countenances, were tired of the poor dental practices in England and decided in 1620 to load all their belongings into a Mayflower moving company transport ship and sail to America; the land of baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet. Upon arrival in the beautifully balmy state of Massachusetts, Starfleet Captain John Smith strode ashore and tripped over Plymouth Rock, gashing his knee in the process. This brought forth much laughter from Daniel Day-Lewis and the other Mohican tribe members who were taking a break outside one of their casinos.

After the rest of the Pilgrims unloaded their steamer trunks and Louis Vuitton suitcases from the ship, they were invited in to the casino for the buffet, which in Mohican meant “germ-fest” and since it was Thursday, the kids ate free. The Pilgrims winked knowingly to themselves as they were told it was still early and therefore wouldn’t need “reservations”.

After the meal, the Pilgrims opened their fortune cookies, revealing their lucky lottery numbers, left a small, insignificant coin as a tip for Sacajawea, (about one dollar in today’s market) and waddled back to the ship where they all unbuckled their pants and fell asleep in front of the TV to a rerun of I Love Lucy.

So there you have it, a fairly accurate recap of the first Thanksgiving celebration as told to me by my grandmother. I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!

Thank You!

To all our Veterans who have given their time and for some their lives, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Because of you, we live in the greatest country in the world. God bless you all!

Image courtesy of http://www.wunderground.com

Share The Road!

Sometimes I have no idea what I will write about for the upcoming Monday. During such times, I like to head out on a run and hope something will come to me. Tonight was such a night and I certainly was not disappointed.

Whenever I’m driving my car, I always give runners and bicyclists a little extra room as I pass them and I will slow down just a bit as I do so. I wish everyone would be as respectful and courteous.

I don’t usually run on the sidewalks around my town because the transition from sidewalk to road and back again is not always smooth; one might have to adjust their stride or navigate some dips or broken pavement during those transitions. Therefore, I run on the street, facing traffic, as close to the side of the road as I can. I will admit to not always wearing the most reflective or eye-catching running gear so that’s on me, but my most recent run was a bit more exciting than normal.

I was running one of my usual routes, about a mile and a quarter in, when I came upon a driveway for one of the many condo complexes in town. As I approached the drive, I saw a car approaching from my left as it was heading to the intersection of the driveway and main roadway. There is a STOP sign at the junction and the car and I arrived at that location at the same time. As most drivers will do, this driver decided to roll past the designated stopping line to get a better view of any traffic coming from his left.

I was eighteen inches away from having to perform my best “Bo and Luke Duke slide across the hood” of this BMW when the guy jammed on his brakes as I ran past the front of his grill. His feeble “I’m sorry” hand gesture did little to filter my response and I’m sure he and his companion both rationalized how I was in the wrong.

Incidents like this happen quite often to runners and cyclists alike. We have every right to use the roadways for our exercise and training, we just need everyone to use their heads, follow the rules and share the road.