I hope you can get the hip issues resolved quickly, Steph.

I made butternut squash puffs for tomorrow. And I rearranged the living room to make room for the tree, which I’ll be decorating Saturday, along with my annual Lord of the Rings extended edition rewatch. I actually prefer the new configuration in general, so I’ll probably keep it after the tree comes down. Much better flow.

Jeez, Tep, a torn labrum is pretty incapacitating. I hope it's something else and more readily fixed.

I made the cranberry sauce. [Monica: "A monkey could make that!!"]

I stupidly walked away from the stove when it should have been on low, happily burbling away and busting cranberries. But in fact it was still on high, burned off liquid, and set off the smoke alarm. What a dumbass. However, I was able to save it and doctored it with a bunch of off-book ingredients (Campari! Ginger Juice! Liquid Smoke! No wait, not that one!) and it might be my best ever. My pot does not look good.

I then decided to get ahead of the stuffing by cutting the ciabatta loaves up, so I sat on the couch with a cutting board and a big bowl and watched a reaction video. She was watching Saving Private Ryan for the first time so the reactor and I both got weepy.

This morning I took my downstairs neighbor, Jamille, out to brunch. She's a single mom and never has any time for herself, but she sent her son down to her mom's place early (she's driving down tomorrow), so I took her out to fancy Zazie brunch. Then I took her to get a mani-pedi, and I got my nails done. Fun to spend more focused time with her.

EM is coming early tomorrow morning, which is good because I need some cleaning help.

I have to do the stuffing and mashed potatoes but both of those are fairly easy, especially now that I've torn up the bread and I already have turkey stock. The mushroom stew will take some time, and I might make Emmett do the Mac and Cheese after he gets here.

So we'll have six people here and we haven't had that many mouths for several years. It'll be fun.