According to my reckoning this should be Christmas day and I doubt very much that you’ll have time to read this but I just want to wish you a happy day and please don’t eat too much!
I remember something that occurs every year when the males at the table get up and announce they have to take a walk, to work off some of the turkey, the stuffing, cranberry sauce, candied sweet potatoes, Brussels sprouts, corn and the heavy Christmas pudding and “hard” sauce that they had eaten. Of course they left in lots of time to avoid washing up. A well planned strategy they seem to use every year. They regard it as women’s work, I guess.
Never mind! It’s done! The meal is over, and it was a success: the turkey moist and delicious, the dressing yummy, the vegetables tasty and the Christmas pudding just as delectable as it was last year. After the dishes are done, and the left-overs put in the fridge the women can go in and lie down in the living room and congratulate themselves on a job well done and sip a cup of coffee (maybe with a splash of rum in it!) and enjoy the feeling of once again winning the domestic lottery!
And, thank God, it’s nearly time for bed.
Helen Lang has been the Peninsula News Review’s garden columnist for more than 30 years.
