As I’ve just woken up from my Thanksgiving Drunkenness, I’m thinking of brilliant moments from Thanksgivings past.

One of these brilliant moments was crabbing. (This is partly spurred by an email from my sister, which came, Blackberry style, from another crabbing extravanza).

But, sister aside?

Crabbing is for men.

Manly men. Men who swear (Mainly when they bang their heads against something on the boat, lose their buoys, tangle the prop with rope, or turn 200 yards of other rope into a Gordian knot).

It is also an outstanding opportunity to roll out onto the sea and commune with nature at its saltiest.

It’s not so good for a photographer, as most of those opportunities come while the little crab boat is hammering through swells and salt-laden seawater is threatening the integrity of your lovely lens.

By “lovely” I mean to say “expensive.”

Still, on a good day, even a wussy photographer can enjoy it. There’s a certain rhythm to whacking in and out of the waves and even if the boat seems in constant danger of sinking (only to me, I should add) the high tech equipment onboard seems quite cool.

It never starts that simply.

I drove up to the coast early with the OAF to follow. I got to the hotel, skidded over to the trailer park (and I mean that in the best possible way) touched in with the fambly, and headed back to the hotel by the sea (and the totally obnoxious lighthouse horn).

I wandered about a bit and wondered about a bit. Then walked out the hotel door.

Lo and behold, apparitionally, there was the OAF. We walked into the hotel and I showed her the arched room, the fireplace, the view. She wandered around for awhile and I asked her if she wanted me to light the fire? She glared back at me. I asked about three more questions to which she was unresponsive or snarly. I asked about her mood.

She looked at me like I was insane.

I asked again, “why are you so crabby?” (heh! Get it? “Crabby!!!!)

She thought and said, “oh, because my car died at the gas station down the hill.”

This was at least 10 minutes AFTER she had arrived and in the interim she had forgotten that her car was dead, and not just dead, but actually pulled up next to a gas pump. She was still cranky, but the fact that her car was dead and gonna be towed had completely slipped her mind.

It must be nice to live in the moment.

Fortunately, she had stopped at the first gas-station in town, which was only 150 yards from the hotel. This was extremely fortunate, as the BAG had stopped about 10 miles out of town and the car had restarted there.

Turns out it was just a loose connection to the battery post. Good news for the OAF, bad news for the car which she was soon to total in an accident that is an entirely different story.

The next day it was off to the crabbing and the RV park (I swear, someday I will be able to say things like that without the loathsome hipster disdain that creeps, unbidden, into my voice. I suck).

Totally fucking awesome. The crabs came in (we had a vast haul on the last day) and the chefs did the other thanksgiving foods to perfection. We may have been in a trailer park with a big neon palm tree, but it was the best trailer park, ever, with a big neon palm tree. And, really, it was kind of my goodbye party to/for the US.

I doubt any Thanksgiving will ever rival getting lost with the BKF and JAE in the rainstorm in Death Valley, but this one gave a pretty good run for it.

I should just mention that in many of my photos HYS looks a great deal like another of my favorite acronymicons, HST.