A turkey of a Christmas story

[NCTexan]

My wife was just discussing all of the alternatives available today for the Christmas turkey... plain old frozen, fresh, organic, brined, and even Cajun dressing stuffed TurDucken from our supermarket.

It reminded me of a true story from some friends when we lived in South Florida.

These were "city folks" and took their family to NC for a country Christmas in a rented mountain cabin. On the way there, they saw a country store advertising fresh killed "free range" turkeys.

They bought a giant bird and arrived at their cabin in time to pop it into the oven and prepare all the sides. "Mom" put the turkey on the table and commented on its huge, bulging and beautifully browned breast.

"Dad" raised the carving knife and took a big slice off the breast... to the screams of everyone at the table.

Pouring forth from the turkey was an avalanche of grain, seeds, weeds and bugs! This was because "Dad" had sliced through the crops of this fresh killed bird that had been cooked guts and all.

Needless to say, this was a Thanksgiving dinner that only consisted of sides and desserts. They told us that they will never look at turkey in the same way again.

Silly city-slickers!

 

[CajunBass]

Back when I was a kid, my dad won a live turkey at a turkey shoot. I remember him coming home with that stupid turkey with a string around his neck (the turkey's neck, not dad's) like you'd lead a dog on a leash.

Well, he'd just finished installing indoor plumbing in the house, so he locked the turkey up in the old outhouse. There were a couple of weeks to go before Christmas, or Thanksgiving, or whatever the holiday was, and we kids of course made a pet out of the turkey. We go down and peek through the cracks in the boards and look at it, and poke corn in to feed it.

Come time, dad killed the turkey, mom cooked it, set it on the table, and nobody would eat it.

My mother told him if he ever DARED to bring home something that was still alive he would have to answer to her.

Years later he did raise a couple of hogs, but we kids HATED those old sows. We were glad to eat them.