Life is Different on Red Dragon Farm

Over the years, my family has had many interesting holidays. Sometimes it's because of the events of the day, sometimes it's the food, but usually, it's the people. This year, Thanksgiving proved to be no different.

Every fall, around Veteran's Day, the fair comes to town, complete with rides, wild animal shows, 4H competitions and funnel cakes. I managed to miss it this year... or so I thought, for one of the guests at dinner was a carny.

He runs one of the exotic animal exhibits and when it came time for the fair to pack up and go, his truck broke down. My brother Jerry towed him and he and his menagerie has been living at my brother's tow yard since Veteran's Day. I'm not sure exactly what is wrong with the truck, but apparently they are waiting on a part.

So Paris (the carny) comes to dinner with Jerry. And arriving with them, in the backseat of Jerry's car, is a dwarf horse named Timmy. On on Paris' lap, a two-headed turtle.


Paris and Timmy (Timmy LIKES corn on the cob!)

Click on the picure to see it bigger!
I don't know if turtle(s) have a name, but they spent most of the day sitting on the mantle. Mom's not sure how she felt about that....

My dad was absolutely thrilled. He does a morning talk show Saturday mornings at a local radio station, so he interviewed Paris on the life of a carny - how he got into it, what it's like to live the life... He started out working as animal retrieval - removing snakes, skunks, nuscience animals in California. Then he began running across some oddities and began collecting them. I'd like to actually hear the interview when Dad's done with it.

Dinner was terrific. Mom's turkeys, potatoes and Dad's stuffing were wonderful - my sweetpotatoes weren't too sweet, which made up for the abundance of really sweet stuff I also brought. Paris raved about the pumpkin pie, the Gooey cake turned out really well. The brownies disappeared almost as if by magic. It was a full and happy table!


Z-boy learned how to make turkeys at school. Oreo cookies, malted milk balls, candy corn, M&Ms... all held together with chocolate icing! Can you say "sugar bomb"?


Dad, brother John, cousin Tania and the man in blue is Paris.


Enjoying dinner: brother Jerry, Darling Man, and brother Matt. Mom shakes her head at yet another weird story being told at the table...


The "kids'" table: Z-boy, and John's kids.


It was nice to see Tania. We don't see her often, but her Dad took off with his wife to Puerto Rico and her kids were with their dad, so she was on her own. And came to dinner with us! We also had a surprise visitor - the lovely lady in purple is my mom's best friend Dorothy. I haven't seen her in years. She married an old high school sweetheart and moved to Tennessee or Kentucky (I'm not sure which). Now they're buying a house back here and Mom is over the moon to have her best friend back in town.

As the afternoon wound down and headed towards night, the kids played, some of the grownups walked, some downloaded pictures into the computer of the holiday festivities. Chester (a very large cat) decided the time was right for a nap. She chose Dad's lap for the locale, so Dad joined her.



As with most holidays, the serious napping signals the end of the day. Darling man and Z-boy headed home and to bed. I stayed to help with a little more clean up and to pack up leftovers. When I got home, I could hear both guys snoring. I climbed into bed myself shortly thereafter and Thanksgiving was history as soon as my head hit the pillow.