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Post by Grug - American Neanderthal on Nov 23, 2016 20:04:19 GMT -7
Seems like every year PC gets worse, can't wish anyone a Happy thanksgiving because it was a feast after a massacre of some poor innocent indians at one time or other back in the day. Well I wasn't there so I'll just stick to the thanking God day for all we have. Have a good one.
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Post by HiTemp on Nov 25, 2016 12:58:01 GMT -7
You know, I grew up about 20 miles away from where the first settlement in the Plymouth, MA area was located. I don't think there's a gradeschooler in MA that hasn't been on field trip to the Mayflower and Plymouth Rock, Plymouth Plantation and the Miles Standish homestead. Those places tell you what life was life then, why they came here, what they risked, who financed them, what happened when they got here, and the whole deal of Thanksgiving and the many surrounding events.
The closest I've seen to the truth of it is Rush Limbaugh's version of the first Thanksgiving, though that is incomplete. It was in fact an escape from a tyrannical government that asserted its power over the religious freedom of individuals. It was toe the line with the British monarchy having the final say in politics AND religious matters or be executed. Many escaped to Holland and practiced their worship there until this opportunity to settle in the new frontier opened to them.
It's still a mystery why they chose to leave at such a time that arrival would be just in time for snow season. Perhaps they didn't have Jim Cantori to flail about on a wind-driven beach warning of hurricane possibilities or a good Farmer's Almanac to tell them there would be no planting until late March, early April. They got there and a good number of them starved or died of illness that first winter.
In their quest for food, they did find game and fish aplenty available, but also found as they explored along the coastline that more than one of the Indian tribes had stockpiled corn in these large mounds that they tried to conceal with branches. The pilgrims took a good amount of this corn to feed themselves and had absolutely zero idea that they were desecrating burial sites considered holy ground by those local tribes. Rush's version puts a lot of emphasis on the alteration of the Compact from a communal style settlement that was failing them to a capitalistic style settlement that greatly increased their productivity and wealth. It was in this trading with the local Indian tribes that a basic trust, a method of communication was established that allowed for a resolution of the corn theft/grave robberies. Were it not for that, we'd all be Europeans (or Native Americans) now, because the pilgrims had no clue how close they actually came to being hunted down and killed, every last man, woman, and child of them.
When the theft of the corn was brought up, the pilgrims involved tried to claim they had every intention of finding out whose corn it was and repaying (with interest) for having taken it. They produced carefully recorded lists of every bit of corn they took, but rather than seem to appease the Indians, it inflamed them to know so many of their buried loved ones had been disturbed. It was only when the purpose of those mounds was revealed to the pilgrims that they were sickened at their own actions, having no clue what they'd actually done. Somehow the genuineness of those expressions were picked up by the representatives of Massasoit, the leader of the Wampanoag tribe, the ones who'd befriended the starving settlers and helped them out the first few years there. This was not a sheer act of generosity either; the Wampanoag had been decimated by disease and were fearful of a hostile takeover by their neighbors to the west, the Narragansett Indians. So befriending those settlers had strategic advantages useful to Massasoit.
The corn was replaced and a suitable amount of excess added to compensate for damages. Furs and other goods were added to the payback also. It was the resolution of this grave robbing issue that set the stage for what became a Thanksgiving feast. Because trust had been restored, and because the pilgrims were working their own land versus commune land that gave them one share whether they worked hard or not at all, there was a bounty to be shared and thanks to be offered for that bounty. They shared it with the local tribes and it must have been great because PC had yet to be invented.
My family and I have a lot to be thankful for, even with the good shares of tragedy we've had this year.
Sorry I didn't have a free second to get on line yesterday, but Happy belated Thanksgiving!
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Post by Grug - American Neanderthal on Nov 25, 2016 16:13:47 GMT -7
I had heard the Limbaugh version, and knew it was little more involved, but never knew the rst of that, but I do have a interest in military history, and know that the east coast was raided for years before the 1st settlers landed, so it was not like they didn't know who the europeans were or never had issue. Years before the 1st thanksgiving or the "pequot massacre" some are citing as the basis of the the "thanksgiving feast", the colony at Jamestown came under attack by indians, and they wiped out the smaller villages around it along killing over 300 europeans, so its not like it was all peaceful until the white decided to up and 'massacre' the poor indigenous people who were helpless. It drives me nut that people can live in their own private reality.
But anyway, we had a good one too, and also had a lot to be thankful for. Glad to hear yours went well.
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Post by HiTemp on Nov 27, 2016 16:56:44 GMT -7
Glad to hear you had a good day. I attempted this year to try Alton Brown's Green Bean Casserole recipe that has intrigued me for a couple years now. It came out pretty good, it tastes great, but Geeze Louise it ties up the damn oven all day at searing temperatures just this side of the sun such that you can't really cook anything else alongside it. 450°F for most of an hour just to toast the onions. Pfffffft. If I make it again, it's gonna be a can of those French's fried onions for me, none of this flame-throwing Alton Brown stuff. Then you gotta cook the dang casserole at 400°F. I think it would work just fine with the already fried onions and could easily be cooked at 350 where everything else that goes in the oven (except the turkey) cooks. I brined my turkey overnight using equal parts salt and light brown sugar. Guess it was about 1/3 to 1/2 cup of each and the better part of a couple gallons of water. I brined it in one of those Home Depot Homer buckets with a plastic bag lining it, then let it sit in the fridge overnight. I think it makes a big difference in how moist the turkey is and the cost is virtually nothing, just your time. My slacker chicken flock that I got in mid June has now started laying eggs. The leghorns (white eggs) have been laying for about 3 weeks now, first one then two and now three of the four at least are producing. The other ten brown egg layers just today produced the first egg. Everywhere I read the answer to how long before they start laying, it's always 16-20 weeks. When I had chickens as a kid I seem to remember it took 5 to 6 months before they started, but who knows how it works now because we didn't have global warming then and most of us sprayed Right Guard right out of the can without a second thought for the ozone layer. So maybe that climate stuff has had an effect, but far as I'm concerned I just got a bunch of slacker chickens .
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Post by Grug - American Neanderthal on Nov 27, 2016 18:31:51 GMT -7
Did you threaten them? My wife will threaten to make soup.
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Post by HiTemp on Nov 27, 2016 21:01:17 GMT -7
Did you threaten them? My wife will threaten to make soup. Well, kind of, perhaps not that directly. I would say things to the wife in earshot of the chickens like, "Well, we aren't going to have any omelettes with these slackers so let's go get some hot wings." Or "You know, the hatchery asked me if I wanted meat chickens or laying hens... I told them layers but maybe they made a mistake. Grilled chicken sounds good right about now." It didn't work, they pretty much operate on their own schedule and humans don't seem to be allowed an input. Our job just seems to be keeping the water fresh and the feeder topped off, and providing the occasional handful of bread or whole corn, watermelon, squash, or any decent pile of greens. Couple weeks ago the wife was astonished at what she saw looking out the back door. It was late afternoon, around 4 pm or so, and I was sitting back to the house in this large backed plastic lawn chair. There was a chicken perched on my left arm near the elbow and the wife thought me and the chicken were having a conversation. Turns out though it was just a really nice day, temps high 50s with a slight breeze, I'd worked outside all day, and I was snoozing (er, I mean winding up my work day) outside in the chair, beautiful day and all. I had taken some field peas out to give the chickens earlier and forget about them, they were still in my shirt pocket, and that is what was holding the chicken's interest. Every few seconds she'd reach over and put her head into my pocket and snag a field pea, but from my wife's POV it appeared I had said something profound to the bird and she was nodding deeply and profoundly, acknowledging the profoundness of what she thought I was saying (to a chicken, no less!). So I put up with a week or more of "Chicken Whisperer" jokes and assorted smart-assed chicken related remarks. Then after supper one night I said, "Did you know that the addition of chicken poop to cosmetic products is nearly undetectable?" No more smart-assed chicken remarks after that. In a separate but related matter, last week I spotted a guy at the Farmer's Market downtown selling chicken poop. Was in a brown bag like a lunch bag sized bag, half full and stapled shut, and he was getting $3.75. FOR A BAG OF CHICKEN POOP!!!! And in the 10 minutes or so I was in that section of the market I bet he must have sold 5 bags. At $3.75!!!! And here I am at the house throwing hundreds of dollars of this organic gold into my compost pile every week when I could be selling lunch bags of the stuff at the Market for... only $3.50 a bag. I'm sittin' on Ft. Knox and didn't even know it.
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Post by Grug - American Neanderthal on Nov 28, 2016 8:45:15 GMT -7
All that glitters is not gold, and gold definitely doesn't glitter, or smell good at times it seems.
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Post by random on May 4, 2017 6:05:36 GMT -7
Heh, Thanksgiving is family holiday when you get together with your family and friends to have nice evening. But as I remember there's opposite holiday on july 25 holidays when you must be alone. If I'm not mistaking. Anyway it's funny.
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