Bonfires and Turkeys

A few weeks back Blowfish and I went to a Bonfire Party in a riding arena. It makes sense, plenty of space, no chance of the fire spreading and  when it's over just use your regular equipment for dragging the  arena.

We had a fine time, which is noteworthy because Blowfish is not often comfortable at gatherings where he does not know most of the people.  He is , however, always a foodie and the food here was good and plentiful. There were good ol boys manning turkey fryers of every description.. Some of those fryers were cooking turkeys, others were loaded up with pork shoulders or beef slabs. Tables were laden with every vegetable, casserole, salad, bread and dessert you ever heard of and probably some you have not.  Blowfish was a happy man.

On the way home from this outing Blowfish allowed as how he thought he should fetch home a turkey fryer.
This was not unexpected. I had my diversions ready.

" You  think you will miss any of your games standing out in the road watching that fryer"?
" The road?  I will be right out on the deck!"
" Who's deck are you talking about?"
" Fishy, what the tarnation is wrong with you? Our deck, right out the Garden Room door. I can look in the window and see the games just fine".
" Will that deck hold a ton of sand"?
"What?"
" Well, I just do not see how you are going to build a sand pit to set your turkey fryer in up on that deck. You saw how those experienced fry men each had their own station? Reason being if one combusted  the others would not?  Could you see in the dark, each station was set up in it's own little sand pit. Not to mention they had fire extinguishers out there too."
" Fishy, didn't you love that deep fried turkey taste?"
" Yes I sure did. The fry master I chatted with allowed he had been frying his for the last decade or so. I asked him if it was easy or if there was any steepness to the learning curve. He said he didn't think he had burned up more than a dozen turkeys, one truck and one shed, but  no houses."
" Fishy. I am  getting us a turkey fryer.  I am going to cook the turkey this Thanksgiving . I will agree to putting it 50 yards from the house, the fencing, the trees  and all vehicles. I will not go all the way up to the road . I can make  a sand pit but I think it  foolish."

Yesterday, when Blowfish came home he drove that big dually truck of his  all the way down the drive nearly to the garage. I heard banging and clanging for a bit then he went on and parked the truck up in the regular spot. He usually does this sort of thing when he is unloading something heavy  to be stored in the garage.

He came in whistling. With that extra little bounce in his step that indicates this is a fella real pleased with himself.  I was in the Kitchen  tearing lettuces for our salads.
"Hi. I can see you liked your day.
 How about a glass of red while I prep dinner and you tell me about you?"
Happy man told me a lot of things about his day with nary a mention about objects in the garage. We had dinner then I had to evacuate while the heads were dissecting the SuperCommittee failures.  I am too young to have a stroke. Plus, demented women foaming at the mouth angry are never attractive. Later he wandered up to my retreat and stayed to watch Antiques Road Show with me before going down to get his daily dose of facebook love from former students.  Still no mention of new objects in the garage.

This morning Blowfish brought the paper in saying it was already getting heavy with
 the early circulars for Black Friday sales. Our normal routine is to separate the circulars
from the actual paper. We rarely review them but today I skipped the paper and went straight to studying the slicks.  Blowfish looked up from reading the paper and said, " What are you doing?"

"Searching"
"What for? Is there something you need?
 Are those the grocery specials you're studying?"
" I am not studying the grocers advertisements"
" Don't you want to read the paper?"
" I got more important things on my mind this morning."
" What are you looking for?"
"An early Christmas present"
" What would that be?"
" A fire extinguisher and a truckload of sand"

"You are a cruel woman!!!!!!"

" Have you seen that good hands ad about all the turkey fryer fires?I have no interest in being their  Christmas commercial. I have not said one thing against you frying  our turkey. What I am saying is take some reasonable precautions so we can all enjoy the day".

" You and I don't have the same idea about 'reasonable'."

" Shall I download the video on the proper techniques for putting out turkey fryer fires? And might I remind you the  Turkey Fry Gods of the bonfire gathering all had sandpits and extinguishers? No need for you to be acting like I ordered hazmat suits for everyone There is nothing wrong with my idea of reasonable. Yours could use a bit of fine tuning though."

Blowfish returned to his coffee and paper while I continued to read the ads.
After a bit he said, " I will bring home sand and an extinguisher today."
" Thank you".
" What are you looking for now?"
" Orange cones"
" What?"

" You know those orange safety  traffic cones?
 I don't want yo to get run over on Thanksgiving
while you are up on the road frying our turkey"
.