Good thing turkey is a lean protein

Yesterday afternoon, our CEO sent out an email announcing that the office would be closing early today, at three p.m., in honour of Thanksgiving. Which, in theory, is very nice. Except that, in practice, we still have to bill our 40 hours this week and he did not provide a billing code for those two to three missing hours. And apparently everyone in my hardworking department ignores such things, which means that if I leave early, I'll look like a slacker. And even if I do leave at three, it won't help us get on the road any earlier, because Torsten still has to work until at least five.

But still. It's a nice gesture. And I have plenty of stuff to do today anyway, including the very tedious task of filling out separate reimbursement requests for every single book that I ordered on the company dime--all twenty or so of them. See, another nice thing this company does is give you $500 a year to spend on books or publications relevant to your job. So, I went ahead and dropped $500 on Amazon, which made me very happy (and also got me a lot of editing staples that I had been frustrated not to have, like, I don't know, a dictionary, and also the Chicago Manual). And now I have to fill in, sign, and photocopy thousands of expense reports in order to be reimbursed.

But hey, don't look a gift horse in the mouth, right? Especially because now I have something useful to do between the hours of three and five today. Then we'll be getting on the road with my sister (and pretty much everyone else in the country) and seeing how long the normally four-hour drive will take us today. I think our Thanksgiving record is eight hours. We're hoping to avoid that monstrosity today, but we'll see.

I know a lot of you have already left for your various holiday destinations, but for those of you who are still here and reading: what are you doing for the holiday? And also, what do you WISH you were doing?