How we roll

Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays. Being fixated on food, that should come as little surprise. But it's more than that. Perhaps more than any other holiday, even the pseudoreligious ones, Thanksgiving is about tradition.

But our traditions are somewhat new. Like most San Francisco transplants, we are hundreds or thousands of miles from immediate family, so we've become part of other transplants' ad hoc traditions that have taken root.

So many of these new traditions stand that we are spoiled for choices. Frequently, we go to our friends Matthew and Jim's place, but lately our other dear friends Nick and Russ have been doing a biennial gathering with their families, their friends and their friends' families. That's where we'll be tomorrow, in the company of our newly defined family.

On the Friday after, our friend Hugh has long held an orphans' Thanksgiving among friends because, you know, we haven't eaten enough yet. But it's always great fun, and for some of us one of the few times in the year we get to see each other.

And so it is again this year. Two days of feasting and fun followed by a mild coma for the following weekend. 

I am not cooking at all this year; my husband has assumed the duty of breadmaker for both events -- dinner rolls, in fact. All I had to do was select wine to bring. This, I can do.