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Forget the turkey. Forget the pumpkin pie. Forget traveling over the river and through the woods to grandmother's house. Forget everything you know
about Thanksgiving. 

No longer is it a day for families to gather and give thanks for their blessings.

It’s a day to shop. 

The Friday after Thanksgiving has come to be known as Black Friday, an ominous moniker if ever there was one. Up to that day, chain retailers would have you believe they have been operating all year at a loss. On Black Friday, which marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season, the red ink magically turns to black and from then until December 31, their stores operate profitably. The chains advertise special Black Friday prices on merchandise research shows will draw the most people through the doors. Crazed bargain-hunters camp outside for hours, waiting to charge through the doors when they are thrown open at 12:01 a.m. or 3 a.m. or 6 a.m or whenever. Every year you read about some poor soul being trampled to death in a Black Friday stampede.

But opening early on Black Friday is no longer good enough for the management at Sears, Kmart, The Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic and Toys ‘R Us, all of which have announced plans to stay open Thanksgiving Day, along with Walmart and Target which will open at 8 and 9 p.m. respectively Thanksgiving night.

Keeping their stores open on Thanksgiving, and opening them in the wee hours on Black Friday, not only ruins the holiday for the hundreds of thousands of employees who have to staff the check-out lines and/or spend the day stocking shelves in anticipation of the hordes who will rush through the doors, it perverts the meaning of Thanksgiving and, for that matter, Christmas. The Three Wise Men didn’t camp outside Gold ‘R Us, the Frankincense Republic and Myrrh-Mart, and they sure as hell didn’t trample anyone to death.

I am making a note of the chains that will be open on Thanksgiving and will never patronize them again. 

If you agree, please share this posting and do the same. If enough Americans say "enough already," perhaps the greedy bastards who run them will learn that some things, including Thanksgiving, are, and should remain, sacred. 

Weight watching

Last night we went to an Italian restaurant.
I couldn’t decide what to order. Everything sounded good.

Luckily, the family at the next table – a couple and their college-age son – received their food shortly after we sat down so I could see what they ordered. The wife had one of those individual pizzas the size of a salad plate. The husband and son had pasta.

Over the next half hour, the wife ate exactly one slice of her pizza (but not the crust). The husband and son took four – maybe five – bites of pasta. When the waiter asked if they wanted doggy bags, they said no.

I don’t get it but then, I love to eat. Always have. I weighed 220 pounds at age 15. Too fat. My senior year of high school I went on a starvation diet. By graduation, I tipped the scales at an anorexic 140. Too thin.

For 43 years I’ve maintained my weight at a reasonable 180 through a combination of exercise and dietary restraint. It’s a nonstop struggle because I
a) would rather sit on my ass all day and b)  have the appetite of a billy goat.
I could easily consume two pizzas, a barrel of KFC (original recipe), a dozen glazed doughnuts and an entire pecan pie at one sitting. When I read about food contest winners who downed 68 hot dogs in 10 minutes, I ask, “That's all they could manage?" 

My wife and I once went to dinner with a client and her husband. We ordered chicken. Only a little meat was left on the bones by the time we pushed back our plates. “Are you finished?” the client’s husband asked. “Yes,” we replied. He picked up the bone from my plate and, like an Electrolux, sucked the remaining meat off it. He then did the same with my wife’s. It was fascinating and revolting at the same time and we couldn't act as if we found his behavior odd because he was, after all, the client's spouse.

If I had to choose, I'd rather eat like my client’s husband than the family we sat next to last night. Food is one of life’s greatest pleasures. I don’t understand people who don’t enjoy it, or, even more inexplicably, eat tasteless food – tofu, fish, lettuce, fruit and stuff like that – just to stay thin. 

I could write more but need to bike to the gym, a 12-mile round trip. When I get home, I’m making brownies. Publix was having a “buy one, get one free” sale on Duncan Hines Brownie Mix that I couldn’t resist. I'll make the first package in a couple of hours and, assuming my wife doesn't sneak a sliver from the pan, eat them all after dinner. There was a BOGO on Pillsbury Frosting, too, but I didn't buy any, even though I prefer my brownies slathered with fudge. 

Moderation, you know.

Why the GOP has to go away once and for all

Last night, after the networks had called Ohio for the president and it was clear Romney was going down, I posted my reaction on Facebook.

“The Republican Party is too damaged to recover from this loss. It has to do what the Whigs did in 1856: Throw in the towel. Dissolve. Form two new parties -- a moderate but progressive party that will attract centrist Democrats who are concerned their party is moving too far to the left, and another party where all the people who consider abortion to be the #1 issue facing America can gather together. The party of Lincoln, which was formed from the remnants of the Whigs, is kaput.”

I was blown away by the number of people who agreed with me.

I’ve been joking that I, who write a blog followed by fewer than 500 readers, am America’s Only Objective Journalist®. It’s my way of expressing disgust with the way the media have fawned over Obama, not holding him to the same standards of accountability to which it has held previous presidents, but I’ll come clean here: I’m a Democrat. Who voted for Romney.

Why? For the same, fundamental reason more people voted for Obama than for my candidate -- because Romney stood up for me, personally, just as Obama stood up for women, the poor, African-Americans, Hispanics, gays, et al.

Romney validated what I am -- a small business owner. He recognizes -- recognized -- the value of small businesses in terms of fueling our economy. And, for 30 years, I ran one. As much as I’d like to think I built it myself, I know full well I didn’t. I had a handful of incredibly talented, dedicated, hard-working, fiercely loyal employees who believed in me, and gave it their all. Without them, I would have been a freelance writer. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Romney got my vote because of the tone in Obama’s voice when he said, “You didn’t build that.” The disdain the president, who has never worked in the private sector, has for small business owners is unmistakable and disturbing. It was every bit as off-putting to me as Todd Akin’s comments on “legitimate rape” were to women. On social issues, I agree with the president. That’s why, years ago, I left the Republican Party and became a Democrat.

I hope the GOP, which is clearly under the control of people who don’t understand that most Americans are able to separate their religious beliefs from their political beliefs, will hold a meeting, vote to disband, and, from the ashes, form two new parties.

Akin, Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, Richard Mourdock, Rick Santorum, Sarah Palin and all their self-righteous cronies can form a Theocratic Party, hold conventions, wring their hands, pray and, for all I care, go straight to hell or, as the case may be, heaven. They’ll have a built-in constituency of voters who will assure their party stays in business – at least through the next few election cycles.

Those who are left can reach out to Americans like me, who think both the Democrats and Republicans have gone off the deep end, and form a new party that believes in fiscal responsibility and in respecting human rights and dignity.

That’s what the Whigs did in 1856 when its members were hopelessly divided between pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions. One of those new parties they founded was called the Republican Party.

Which, after freeing the slaves and accomplishing many other good things for which America is a better place, died of self-inflicted wounds on Nov. 6, 2012.

Don't blame me, I voted for the other guy

Updated Nov 7, 2011

I've now voted in 11 presidential elections. 

Of the 10 previous elections in which I participated, I voted for the winner a whopping three times.

Two of the winners I voted for made me proud. One turned out to be a Bozo.

My first presidential vote, which I cast in my hometown of Auxvasse, Mo., in 1972 at age 21, was for George McGovern. Mine was one of (if I remember correctly) three votes the good people of Auxvasse gave him. Everyone else voted for Tricky Dick and we all know how that turned out.

It’d be nice to find out tonight or tomorrow or whenever the final tally is certified that, this time, I voted for the winner.

But, given my track record, I probably didn’t.

Hope your guy wins. Unless he’s you-know-who.

Endorsement: The only candidate who can get the job done

We, the editorial board of tom.dryden.com, strive to remain above partisan politics.

But when it comes to matters of grave importance confronting our citizenry, we consider it not only prudent but our duty to depart from our role as independent observers of the democratic process in order to endorse the man whom we believe is best qualified to negotiate the labyrinth of challenges we collectively face.

There is no doubt that the campaign leading up to Tuesday’s election has been bitter. Voters are deeply and, perhaps, irrevocably, divided as never before, with both sides asserting their candidate is the only one capable of leading us through the next four years. Both candidates, we must acknowledge, are superbly qualified. Both have campaigned vigorously and tirelessly in order to communicate their visions for our future. To that end, we would ask, borrowing a phrase Ronald Reagan used during his final debate against incumbent Jimmy Carter in 1980, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” 

We believe you are. The incumbent has done a commendable job combating a common enemy who, unchecked, would suck the very lifeblood from us, leaving us weak, wounded and vulnerable. We are safer and more secure today than when he took office. He is a tough, no-nonsense leader who has proven capable of forging the compromises needed to get the job done.

That is why we proudly endorse Lawrence Murphy for re-election to the Lee County Mosquito Control District board.