Happy Thanksgiving

Our Thanksgiving always includes going to my moms. She makes the turkey, my dad makes the stuffing and the rest of us fill everything else in. It's always carbtastic.

We start by a few of us playing cribbage while watching football and rooting for anyone but the Steelers and Cowboys (sorry PIT and DAL fans). We fill our bellies with cheeses my brother has brought from Pike Place Market while waiting for dinner.

The plan is always to eat by 4, but that never seems to happen. It's usually more like 5 by the time everything is ready and put in it's place on the counter to be served up.

We stuff our faces until our bellies are about to burst (my goal is actually to NOT do that this year). Sometimes a couple of us will go for a walk after dinner while others chat. I usually help with the clean up so Mom doesn't have to lift a finger.

We used to play games, but my family is big and Italian and loud and loves to kibitz and it always took 4 hours to play a 1 hour game, so that tradition has kind of gone down the toilet. Now we talk about work and politics and movies and books and music and whatever the hell we feel like, because we like a good debate.

Then we eat pie. I can never believe people have room for pie after all that.

I usually head to the ocean the next day with my friend Heidi, but this year we'll be heading to see Pearl Jam in Portland, then to the ocean on Saturday.

What are your Thanksgiving traditions?

Also a reminder, Dissected will be free on Amazon for your Kindle tomorrow only. Enjoy the Black Friday deal. If you read it, getting a review would be awesome. Reviews truly do help little tiny authors like myself. :)

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours. Enjoy the day, no matter what you do.

Done being thankful

Thankful or taking a poop?

It's not that I have nothing left to be thankful for, but my cousin Natalie made a good point on Facebook the other day. She said this"

"Not to be mean but I could really live without peoples thankfulness after the 15th. I could care less about their thankfulness of coffee, blankets,sunshine,a strangers smile,cars,water and just being a human on a everyday basis. If your posting something stupid about being thankful just stop! No one is gonna say" hey Debbie what happened to your thankful List from the 20th to the 30th" just do yourself a favor and live thankfulness..."

Haha, she's funny and I got tired of trying to think of stupid things to be thankful for. So thank you Natalie for pointing that out. I'll just be thankful every day I wake up because it means I'm still alive.

I will be nowhere near a place like this on Black Friday

I would like to say this about being thankful: If you're one of those batshit crazy kind. Be polite. And most importantly, try not to trample anyone to death.
people that go shopping on Black Friday - I am not, as I loathe the mall, crowds, people in general, shopping and I'm a broke bitch - please remember all the things that your were thankful for just the day before.  Be

One more thing, in honor of Black Friday, the kindle version of my new book Dissected with be free on Amazon this Friday.

Yes I said FREE. One day only.

I ask one thing of you. If you download it, read it and like it, I would love if you would review it for me on Amazon. It really does help sell more books.

If you don't like it, feel free to review it as well, that helps too, but I won't like those reviews as well. Just sayin'.

30 days of thanks: day 22

I'm thankful for sleep.

When I get it that is, which seems like a while now. A good night's sleep anyway.

I can't remember the last night I had a good night's sleep. Every night for the last few weeks I've been waking at 2 or 3 in the morning. Some nights I get back to sleep, some I don't. Like last night I didn't. I've been up since approximately 2:30.

And no, I did not take the opportunity to write. My brain is too mushy to do that.

I could blame the Mexican food last night, but then what is the reasoning for the last 90 days?

I long for a night where I fall asleep at a reasonable hour and don't wake until the next morning. Sleep in, even.

Until then...insomnia and I will be buddies I guess.

I want to mention one other thing, I'm in our local paper today with 3 other authors gone indie. Love if you'd take a read.

Okay, it's Friday, small miracles. Here are the Scribbles...

Pandora Queue song: a shuffle station with Mumford and Sons, Imagine Dragons, Black Keys, and more...Stone Temple Pilots, Big Empty.

Book of the Week: I've not started reading anything yet, been too busy, but going with Catching Fire in conjunction with the movie release. If you've not read the book, you should. You should read all the books. I truly loved all three of them.

Netflix of the Week: I started watching Orange is the New Black. LOVE!

Quote of the Week:

30 days of thanks: day 20

Equality.

Today marks the 150th anniversary of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. I'm not stupid enough to not know we still have a long way to go as a nation, but we've come a long way.

Back then on the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War even Lincoln knew the fight for equality was just starting. I think he'd be disappointed at how long it's taken to make the strides we have in the last 150 years.

Minorities and LGBT's will never be truly equal as long as there is intolerance in our country and as long as people are teaching their children to hate. And yes, I suppose some people just are bigots all on their own, but for the most part, it's learned behavior, so let's stop teaching our children to hate other because of their differences. That's what make us all unique, like snowflakes.

Even women still struggle to find equality in the workplace in this day and age when they're doing equal work.

And racism travels in all directions. Let's all just start oozing love for each other, shall we?

That said, I'm proud to live in one of the first states to legalize gay marriage and I'm so happy I get to see some of my best friends exchange vows next year because of it. Yay Washington!!!

There you have it. I'm thankful for equality. Is it perfect? No. But our country is ahead of many others. And we're still fighting for it because half a nation stood up against the other half and one man spoke out 150 years ago and inspired a nation.

Let's try and make more strides before another 150 years passes us by.

30 days of thanks: day 19

This is one of those days in which I'm finding it hard to be thankful. I've been sleeping like crap. My nose has been stuffed up for days and my mood has been up and down due to many factors in my life.

But, I've been determined to always find something to be thankful for, every day.

Hot wings may be at the top of my list today. Too shallow?

Okay, well, you may think this is shallow too, but I'm going for it anyway...

My Seattle Seahawks. Yep, I went there.

I've been a football fan since I was about 10. My dad has had season tickets since the very first year the Seahawks have been a team. I believe that was 1976. He would take to me at least one game a year.

As I got older, I got more into football and I didn't care if they won or lost, I love my Hawks. I started to go to more games. As many as I could. Whenever he had extra tickets I would say, "Me, me!!"

Eventually, my dad ended up giving his tickets to his law office and if the Hawks were good, I didn't really get to go, but if they had a bad season, me and my husband (this was when I was married of course) ended up going to at least 3 or 4 games a year.

When Hasselbeck came on board, they started getting good again, and the Kingdome came down and Qwest Field went up and we decided to buy our own season tickets.

We were there when the won the NFC Championship. That was exciting!!

Tickets got too expensive, so we gave them up. Then of course I got divorced. Now I'm back to only going to one game a year.

Now we have a good team again and it's been exciting to watch players like Russell Wilson, Richard Sherman and Marshawn Lynch on the field.  10-1!! I truly think we are Superbowl bound this year. If not, at least we had a great season.