How was YOUR Thanksgiving?

We had a very nice Thanksgiving, although it was smaller than in previous years. We had it at my dad's house, and Wanda and Sailor Moon came. Trey, after threatening not to come finally acquiesced. I made a spinach pie, which was good; Alex made pecan and pumpkin pies, which were- well, um. Last year my pecan pie was- there was something wrong with it- and it was hard like concrete, and this year, Alex's pies were all liquid. They were like, Astronaut food! Right? Or something. On a side note, I am somewhat happy that Trey's family is both Far Away and Awful because that means that we don't have to choose or face two Thanksgiving dinners in one day.

Then after dinner Trey went to work, and Wanda called us from Jonesboro to tell us her car had broken down. You may not know this, but Wanda speaks very limited English; she is originally from Poland and so it was difficult to grasp where she was stuck and where we were to go. It was definitely beyond us to figure out over the telephone what had happened to it.

The car was eventually towed back home, so that the Mechanic could look at it the following morning. Wanda seemed to think it was the transmission; The car would not engage in reverse and then she said it lacked power in drive. (sort of, what she actually insisted was no power, no power.)

The next day Mitch came to look at it. Mitch is the mechanic and has a hearing problem I think, or at least he wears a hearing aid, which meant that now I am trying to negotiate between two people who are hard of understanding. Mitch said it was the transmission and then went off to do an already promised brake job for someone. I tried, at length, to explain to Wanda that there was no sense in putting a new transmission in her Dodge Caravan which was a 1994 model and had 253,000 miles. A) You've clearly met and exceeded the life expectancy of said van. Putting a new Transmission in it is not a good idea because something else equally expensive is shortly to fail. B) How do you know the replacement transmission will help? The only transmissions available will be used, and probably not be any better. We have had- well, Dad put several transmissions in his LeSabre, none of which improved the car and all went out; Alex put a transmission in the Raven which was as bad if not worse than the one he had in it; Brandon- granted- Brandon- put one in his Cutlass and it did not work, so that's just the kiss of death.

Wanda insisted on buying a transmission. Mitch was going to charge $350 to put it in. The transmission was going to cost $450 so we called round and found out where they were. I continued to try to discourage Wanda from buying a transmission.

The first place we went was Columbia Auto Parts. Some days, I wonder what the world would be like without women, and then when I visited this place, I remembered. I think the office was made out of discarded cardboard boxes and was covered inside with names and telephone numbers written neatly on the cardboard. The transmission was not out of the car, and would not be out of the car until tomorrow, he said. Wanda wanted to know did they know anyone who could put it in, and yes, he recommended someone. Then everyone came out and admired my car.

Then we went to Newman's, and I still talked to Wanda and this time managed to convince her out of buying the transmission, so we went home and looked up cars on the internet to see what we ought to pay. Wanda wanted first a Caravan, and then changed her mind and we priced a Toyota Highlander. There's a $2000 rebate on the remaining 2006s. You know times in the car business are very, very bad when Toyota is offering massive rebates when the car isn't even being replaced by a newer model. Wanda for some reason wanted all wheel drive. I do not have the slightest idea what she plans to do with it, but she got one with front wheel drive only.

We went and looked at Stone Mountain Toyota. Wanda wanted my Mom and Dad to come too. The more people, is better, she said. So they finally appeared, after Wanda drove the car and was very distracted by the ECT button. What is snow? She asked, snow, snow? I wonder if she thought that if you pushed the button, it would snow. I tried to explain it.

Wanda liked the car. So we sat down to argue about the price. Then my parents appeared.

This turned out to be a bad idea because my mother was unbelievably impressed with the car. For some reason, when she gets to the car dealer, she is mesmerised. O it's so FANCY! she exclaimed! Wow, what a nice car! Oh yes, you should get this car Wanda.

Then she did exactly the opposite of what you are supposed to do when shopping for a car: she took the dealer's side.

You should just buy it, she said, now, whatever they want. It's so FANCY! She insisted. Besides, suppose they just put that one in the ad and then don't really have it.

It was very irritating. I should have known better than to allow her to go shopping for ANYTHING, ever.

O and we saw an Ed Wood movie, "plan 9 from Outer Space." It's supposed to be one of the worst movies of all time- featuring Bela Lugosi in his final role, and a couple of people who pretended badly to be zombies.

I honestly did not think it was one of the worst movies of all time; There are infinitely worse movies, for example, the most recent "Star Wars" movie was much worse; "Armageddon" was terrible; the remake of "The Haunting" certainly counts. It did fail on several important technical points, such as it is impossible to fear the zombies and the movie builds no credence whatsoever. I've seen worse acting, however. The characters engage in long, dull explanations of their actions which don't make a lot of sense (like the Star Wars movie) but they don't seem quite as laughable as the Emperor.

I also should let you know I spat in some child's drink this week. I did have a good reason for doing so! As in, I'm connecting with the students on their level.