Interesting...maybe I need a self-heating pad for ME!
I didn't get Thanksgiving off. We did the traditional thanksgiving meal (sort of) on Wednesday night. I made a chicken for E and myself, since M doesn't like just a baked chicken or turkey. He likes the meat, but it has to be IN something, like fajitas, or a casserole. And A won't touch it. So I made a steak for M, and fries and Frikandel for A. We had green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, and stovetop stuffing. Well....everyone except A. And E won't eat green bean casserole. But we can't have a nice sit down meal because the gaming computer my husband built over the summer takes up 3/4 of the kitchen table and there's nowhere else to put it, so there it lives and we dish up in the kitchen and eat at the coffee table. E and I will have leftovers tonight while the boys do the usual "friday is FRY-day". We aren't big fans of fried foods in general. We do like kipcorn and loempias in the airfryer, and we occassionally like fries with satay sauce, but neither of us can eat that every week, and A needs the routine. He knows friday is the day he eats fries, every week. So we saved the leftovers for tonight while they do their thing.
E is decidedly NOT looking forward to her first driving lesson. She really doesn't want to drive, but we're making her do it because it's really a necessary skill if you are physically able. I went 20 years over here without a license and there have been so many times when it was REALLY inconvenient not to have it. I hate driving, always have, but there are times when you really need to be able to. And she'll learn it so much more easily now than if she waits until she's 45. So she's getting driving lessons. She's dreading it, but knows it's best for her.
A has been playing chess since he was.....I think 4? Opa taught him and he loved it, and I think he was somewhere around 8 when he joined the chess club where he gets lessons and such, and it didn't take long before he had far surpassed Opa's abilities. Opa only knew the basics, but the club teaches the moves and the strategy behind them. There's a girl (Fleur) in his club who placed 2nd, or maybe even tied 1st in the nation for her age group. She's really really good, but her whole family plays. Her parents now run the club since the guy who started it moved a few months ago. But her dad at least plays competitively as well, and her siblings all play. There was a goodbye party for Niels, who started the club, and they organized a tournament for all ages. All the kids in the club and the adults could enter too. Fleur's little sister is only 6, and she beat even the adults she played. She's going to be amazing as she gets older. A won his division within the club last year. They meet every week, get lessons, and then play matches with each other. They keep track of the points all year, and then at the end of the season, the give prizes. He got a book about chess moves and he studied up and used a certain opening he learned about in the goodbye tournament and I think he came in shared 4th place in that and there were like 30 or more people. So he's doing really well with it and he loves it. I'm glad he found his "thing" because Soccer was NOT it.
I have Google maps on my phone and downloaded it for offline use, so even if I lose a cell phone signal, I can still figure out where I am. I call it "exploring new places." It's weird because I can get to different points fairly easily, like I can get from here down to the city, or up to Hershey, or to various places in PA, but then actually navigating around those cities is the issue. It still doesn't bother me too much.