Last Saturday night I had been watching TV and then got up to get a drink of water when I saw the trail of blood, coming out from the refrigerator! If this had been a horror movie, the presence of blood dripping out meant that there was a body inside! Drip, drip, drip… the blood kept coming.

I slowly opened the refrigerator door and found the culprit. My turkey! You see, I normally buy a 16-18 lb. turkey for my Thanksgiving dinner, but this year because of the pandemic, I decided to only buy a small 13 lb. turkey since I won’t be feeding so many people. I usually start defrosting the turkey on the Friday before Thanksgiving, but not thinking clearly, I went on automatic pilot and took the turkey out of the freezer, putting it into the refrigerator to safely defrost. But what I failed to recognize is that a small turkey defrosts a lot quicker than a large one!

Frantically, I scoured the internet for clues as to how long you can wait before roasting a defrosted turkey. The answer I found was 2 days. That meant that I’d have to roast the turkey on Monday!

My friend Susan Haas reassured me that I could cook the turkey on Monday, keep it in the refrigerator then safely distribute it on Wednesday or Thursday. She said they normally ate Thanksgiving leftovers for up to a week following the holiday.

The Butterball turkey site even said you could wait up to four days to keep a defrosted turkey in the oven.

This story reminded me of our previous Thanksgiving disasters. One year our fancy oven with electronic controls gave out … but I don’t know what we did to finish cooking the turkey. I just remember that sinking feeling when I was pushing the buttons and the display was black! Last year my dishwasher gave up the ghost and the sink backed up, but at least there was no problem with the meal.

Another year we were at the home of Frank and Susan Haas and the oven went into the cleaning cycle with the turkey inside which meant, of course, the oven door could not be opened. I forget exactly what was the solution (did they trip the breaker?) except that we ended up not having turkey at Thanksgiving that year.

My husband Carl told me one year when he was growing up, his aunt burnt the turkey and he’d never forget the sight and smell of Black Turkey!

The ONLY solution to my dilemma? Buy another turkey!

I cooked the defrosted turkey on Monday, freezing the meat for another time and promptly went out and bought another turkey! It’s now defrosting more slowly, but now I’m worried that it’s not defrosting fast enough to be cooked tomorrow!

Here are photos from last year’s Thanksgiving … happy memories! This year I’m cooking for only four people, who will drop by and pick up their packages of food. We’ve scheduled a Zoom call with all the rest of our friends.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!