Whatever You Do, Don't Touch That Door.

The Butterball turkey had sat in our freezer, dare I say expectantly, for two weeks, solidly frozen in anticipation of the big day. Or so we thought. When we removed said turkey three days before Thanksgiving only to find it half-way frozen we were perplexed. "Turkeys in freezers do NOT spontaneously defrost," Tony and I insisted to one another. "I mean, it's a freezer, right? It's supposed to freeze the bird, right?"

And then the question we did not want to face arose. It is the question you do not want to consider when there is a massive, half frozen, imported, precious as gold, $60 bird sitting between you and your spouse mere days before the annual pig out. "How long do you think it has been like this? Do you think it's gone bad?"

We have been without turkey for foreign Thanksgivings in previous years. In China, although there is a word for turkey (literally, "fire chicken") there was no way to actually get one in the years I was there. The best we could do were freshly-slaughtered-before-your-eyes chickens.

In Korea one year, a friend's mother smuggled one into the country from the USA under her dress or something, and it miraculously ended up in our oven. In seven years, that was the only time we ate turkey for Thanksgiving. Of course, there were always rumors that one could acquire turkeys in various markets around the country, but in reality, we never managed to get anywhere fast enough to get one of those precious black market turkeys.

But here in Oman, turkeys can be had--rock solid frozen, factory grown, yellow-net-wrapped, Butterball turkeys. The things do everything besides wave an American flag and shoot off fireworks. The Al Fair chain, famous for its porn...I mean pork section, fresh baked bread, and packaged foods also carries turkeys through November and December especially for little flag wavers like us.

So back to the here and now, standing in the middle of the kitchen with a plastic wrapped turkey threateningly half-thawed on the tile floor between us, Tony and I must have looked like we were in the middle of a comedy sketch. We poked and prodded, and hemmed and hawed as to whether this turkey could have been the source of the odd smell in our freezer. "It reeks in there."

"Yeah, but it smells like rotten milk. Do you think it's the turkey?"

"Crap, if it's not the turkey then that means we will have to empty the freezer to find what else has gone bad."

We sniffed and pinched the plastic wrapping around the turkey. And in the end we decided to risk it, threw the sucker into the vegetable drawer in the refrigerator, crossed our fingers, and started to prepare for Thanksgiving Day.

Tony went out and got a new food processor for the event, and then set to work modifying the menu to maximize the use of his new toy.

We pickled beets, baked pies, and experimented with pumpkin cheesecake. We drew criticism from Tian for baking pan after pan of casseroles. "Mom," she insisted, eyes rolling tweenishly. "Nobody (nobody being Tian) eats casseroles. Why are you making so many. They're disgusting." We peeled potatoes, snapped beans, chopped an enormous bag of onions, sliced apples, and boiled things to make them mushy, which is what we do on Thanksgiving.

And on the day of Thanksgiving, we unwrapped the bird to find...it was perfectly defrosted with just a touch of ice left under the wings and in the cavity. Now all of you who were actually there can breathe a sigh of relief--the bird was untainted. Did you really think we would serve you a rotten turkey? Really?

Just be thankful we didn't open the freezer during dinner.