the ol' bobert has to introduce the cast of characters. Playing Bobert is Bobert. Playing Bobert's wife is Shiela, the mother of my mentally ill 16 year old son, Ben. Playing the neigborhood bad dog is Tayloe, who by no chice of mine spent his last 5 years sleeping in my house thinking he was my dog. Hah! Son ofa... Nevermind. And playing my parents are.... well, my parents, who at the time of the story I had not seen in three or four years since they were living in Kansas City. Mo. and I... wasn't.
Okay, the year was like, oh, 1981 and the bobert was living in a wonderful old 5 bedroom house with 4 working fireplaces not far from the James River in Richmond.
My parents ahd flown east to see my brother in Loudound County and tha plan was for them to drive down to Richmond in his car for Christmas Day to spend with Sheila and me. Having not seen them for a long time I wanted everything to go right and had a checklist of stuff to buy and do so that every thing would be, ahhh, perfect. Yep, we were going to have a wonderful Christmas dinner of turkey and all the fixins. Everything was in place for the perfect day.
The day before, we started thawing the turkey and did the last walk through thru the house and everything was perfect. We put the turkey out on the back porch to finish thawing and went to bed knowing that every "t" had been crossed and "i" dotted.
Christmas morning was mellow with music and coffee and not a trouble until... Sheila went to the porch to retrieve the turkey for cooking onle to discover that where we had left the danged thing there was now nothing more than an echo. Now, Tweedsters, with my folks just 5 hours away from knocking on the front door, it don't take no rocket scientists to figure out that this wasn't a real good discovery. We are talking Christmas morning. And where did that turkey go? What, did he wake up in the middle of the night, look thru the kitchen door, see that oven, grow back all the stuff he used to have and fly away in fear? I mean, this weren't no high crime area we lived in, or nuthing. Just didn'r make any sense.
So the poor ol' bobert gt on the phone to see if he could find a supermerket open with a thawed turkey but we're Christmas morning and all I found was one joint that had three ot four frozen turkeys left so I figured... heck, I don't have a clue what I figured... that I'd get in my VW bus and drive down and get one before the other folks who misplaced their turkeys got there and worry about thawing it when I got home. On the way down there I was thinking of how to thaw it. I thought of the commercial dryers in the laudry marts and bathtubs od hot water and... well, ol bobert anin't goina tell you anymore of my ideas for fear of being banned from Tweedsburg or eternally duct taped to the bench in Tweeds Square. (Now there is a toss up...)
Well, I got there just in time to get one of the last two turkeys, stuffed it on the front floor of the VW bus hoping the heater (yeah right, bobert, it was a VW bus...) would start thawing the denged thing. Well, I took the fastest way home since time was not on my side and was within two blocks of the house when I noticed a rather large whitish object on the side of the road and as the VW bus got closer it became apparent that it was indeed the run away turkey. That danged bas dog, Tayloe must have made off with it.
Well, ol bobert pulled right over, got out, grabbed the thing and headed home with it and its cousin, still froze on the floorboard to the VW bus. Well, I took them both in the house. Shiela and I examined the thawed bird and found it to be... well, other than a few fang holes, to be cookable compared to its still frozen cousin.
So, cook it we did. My parents arrived and everything went great. They loved the house and we all had a grand time opening gifts and visiting and then it was time for THE Christmas Dinner. Everything was wonderful. My mom, bless her heart, said the turkey was the best she'd ever eaten and my dad... well, he went bak for seconds... and thirds.
Afer dinner, we were all sitting around enjoying coffee and a little B&B liquir and I look over at Shiela and she at me and we just start laughing uncontrolably. My folks were wondering just what was up. Hey, I just had to tell them. Then there we all were... laughing uncontrolably. Drinking coffee, sipping B&B and digesting dog chewed on turkey.
Don't get no better than that.