More Blessed to Flexi-give

I don't quite know the origins-- it may have started toward the end of high school, so many years back-- but Veggie-Giving has been a tradition loosely kept by a group of my W'ville friends for years now. It usually occurs the day or two after Thanksgiving and has been a time when vegetarians, who traditionally felt marginalized by the holiday, gather to feast. The sort of event suburban teenagers would come up with for an excuse to eat fancy cheese and feel superior. Needless to say, I was never involved in the promotion of the holiday, but was a mere tag-along to the events, the cranky girl who sat on the side and lamented how odd everything tasted without meat.

(Case in point, talking to Creegan the Vegan this afternoon: "Can I come over early to cook the cranberry sauce?" "Cranberry sauce? What will we eat it with?" "What do you mean, you just eat the cranberry sauce." "Without turkey? Can you do that?")

But oh how everything has changed. This year, Nick proposed renaming the holiday to Flexigiving to better reflect our breaking away from the strict Friday after rules of cooking together. The event was held at my house, (without parental supervision, my house is now the cool place to hang for every occasion) the only one of the group who has not even thought of being a vegetarian. And what was a solid group of vegetarians and vegans now has more carnivores than Texas Roadhouse. Both Nick and Lenny flexi-gave even more when they crossed the line and introduced meat to the Veggie Giving potluck-- Nick was somewhat excused because he made soup with the turkey broth of some local free range turkey he personally knew-- but Lenny, she brought chicken.

Moi: What would possessive you to bring chicken to Veggie Giving?! It's called Veggie Giving!

Lenny: I thought it'd make you happy!

It did. Both the hilarity of her line-crossing and the taste of her chicken.

And after all the soups and dips and pasta and Indian and savory pies (but not before the dessert pies, Mallory's wondrous mascarpone and onion dip, and that amazing pumpkin cheesecake), we settled in to play a game that only my WA friends of that blend of nerdiness, creativity, and bawdiness could come up with: f*ck, chuck, or marry with courses of study.

My subjects were Forensic Science (marry for the security), Primatology (f*ck), and Film Noire (chuck. Too much weeping and women bashing for any viable relationship, no matter how long).

Who would you f*ck, chuck, or marry? 19th Century British Empire, Accounting, or Spanish Literature?

*Apologies (or maybe not) for the self-censoring. Even at this age, I can't bear to bring myself to type or say these words without pausing and blushing.