what i did over my thanksgiving vacation, by mr nice guy

i have nothing to say about thanksgiving that hasn't been said a million times by people more eloquent than i. ours was lovely -- the baby got to meet cousins she hadn't yet met (including one cousin even newer than her); mr nice guy's parents had painted his childhood home a new color, which was a tad jarring; it was universally agreed upon that the baby looks suspiciously more like frere nice guy than her purported father; mr nice guy ate until he ruptured his left spleen. some highlights:

the flight over: was totally uneventful. the baby was an angel. very well behaved. at one point, i took her for a walk to the front of the plane where we came across a little old lady who was stretching her legs as well. we had a lovely chat. then she noticed the nose:

nice old lady: what happened to her nose?
mr nice guy: oh it's just a little birthmark that goes away.
nice old lady: my granddaughter had one of those too and it went away!

and then the bad thing happened -- an overly zealous stewardess joined us.

zealous stewardess (getting right up in the baby's grill): LOOK AT THE BABY! SHE'S BEAUTIFUL!
mr nice guy: thanks.
zealous stewardess (rubbing the baby's head! make her stop!): LOOK AT ALL THAT HAIR! MY GRANDDAUGHTER IS TWO AND HAS LESS HAIR THAN THIS!
mr nice guy (cringing): yeah, she was born with a lot of hair.
zealous stewardess (grabbing the baby's legs): WHY IS SHE STARTING TO CRY!? IS SHE GETTING GRUMPY?
mr nice guy: bites tongue so as not to say "oh maybe she doesn't like the fact that you're shouting in her face and vigorously molesting her ."
zealous stewardess: WHAT HAPPENED TO HER NOSE?!
mr nice guy (not able to drop the "tumor" bomb because the nice little old lady is still within ear shot): it's a birthmark.
zealous stewardess: OH NO!
little old lady: it's a birthmark ... that goes away!

damn you, little old lady! she did that again when a sleazy male stewardess -- he who had been too busy hitting on all the lady passengers at the beginning of the flight to get me a pillow -- came up to the front of the plane. he sidled up to us and was forced to look at the baby by his shouting overzealous colleague. she was all "LOOK AT THE BEAUTIFUL BABY!" he was all "what happened to her nose?" and i was all "birthmark." and he was all "oh bummer" and the little old lady was all "that goes away!"

the arrival: we picked up the most bitchin' rental car of all time. check it out here, that's the actual color we had too -- apparently that's the only color it comes in.

when we got to the charmingly repainted house, mater nice guy showered us with gifts: a pack 'n' play, a swing and an infant bathtub she had graciously purchased for the baby. absurdly generous, right? however. since i am a tiny bitch, all i could do was complain that the last thing i wanted to do after a six hour flight was assemble a pack 'n' play. miraculously, she did not banish me from thanksgiving forever.

thanksgiving eve: bizarrely, mrs nice guy declined my invitation to join me as i went to Trader Vic's to meet a bunch of high school friends and get crunked and then drive home ... in my bitchin' rental car (ahh, gotta love LA -- the only megaopolis that actively encourages crunk driving). it was there that i imbibed the best bad drink i have ever had: THE SON OF DR FUNK. the next time you are in town, buy one. supposedly this is where they invented mai thais. whatever. i say, go for the good doctor and stay for his boy. the bartender was this ancient polynesian dude with a ten-pound hearing aid who got every single drink order wrong. that's ok because after one SON OF DR FUNK you can't use your legs or see, much less taste the drink you didn't order.

thanksgiving day: mater nice guy made me wash the turkey, pull out its giblets (eeeee-hhheeeeww) and remove its neck before rubbing it down with a tangy mom-rub. aw yeah, hot nice guy-on-fowl rubdown action. then i met with hungover friends at a park. mrs nice guy and i watched them -- a bunch of slow, fat and tired 30-something year olds -- play touch football at the so-called 2nd annual pilgrim bowl.


thanksgiving dinner: baby nice guy meets the relatives, all of whom mysteriously had very strong drinks in their hands within .034 seconds of walking through the door -- runs in the family, apparently. at the dinner itself we went 'round the table saying what we were thankful for (i was, and still am, thankful for uncle Stewart's epic moustache). then we ate! oh! how we ate! the twin arts of degustation and epicurism achieved their apotheosis that night. how many courses were there? i lost count after my eleventh trip to the buffet table! "gluttony" you say? bah! the turkey, she was succulent and so well-rubbed. carving the bird was superfluous as the meat slipped off the bone if you just looked at it a certain way. the stuffing, a mater nice guy original, was made from a secret recipe that she will carry to her grave, leaving us culinary philistines to languish without (i caught a glimpse of it -- teardrops of a newborn emu and sun-dried possum skins figured prominently). the buttery mashed potatoes had been whipped into a cloud-like consistency by seventeen chippendales dancers! and the ten-pound pies -- oh so many pies! -- garnished with homemade bourbon whipped cream no less! we ate it all, people, and all of it was Good.

at one point uncle Tim and cousin Cassie stood up to perform a dramatic interpretation of king lear wherein goneril addresses her father's 100 knights (played by the rest of us sitting and snarling at the table). i countered that thankfulness-themed dramatic reading with one of my own: the lyrics to 1974's summer quiet storm classic Be Thankful for What You Got by r&b maverick William DeVaughn. the food was marvelous. then we played taboo. drunk.

the flight home: the baby did not sleep. at all. not for one minute. she squirmed, she fussed, she cried, she squirmed some more. it was clearly payback for being so easy on the flight over and then effortlessly slipping into west coast time. then we realized at about 20 minutes from landing that it probably also had something to do with the fact that she had been sitting in a giant turd for a few hours. so we changed her and then she fell asleep. then we landed.

and now we are home. and the baby still thinks it's three hours earlier than it is. she's still waking up every two hours in the middle of the night. screaming. i know what i'm not thankful for, i can tell you that much.