NVNC ID VIDES, NVNC NE VIDES: Thanksgiving, LosCon and the 'New' Mac

I'm going to begin with the 'new' Mac. My husband bought himself a brand new MacBook Pro and I got his old one (which isn't that old and is quite robust enough for my simple needs). I'm slowly adapting to the things that are different from a PC.

What I'm a bit sad about is the loss of the simple photo editing & previewing features I was accustomed to using on my PC. I'm sure that the Mac can do the same (and probably better) things than my PC, but as yet I've not uncovered these features. The thumbnails I am seeing are too small to sort through and the photo editor I have has some quirks I'll need to figure out. I'm sure I'll adapt fairly soon.

So, this post is my first (on this blog) with the Mac. Now, about Thanksgiving.

l-r: my dad, me, my husband at my brother's
beautiful home for Thanksgiving

It's been years since our part of the family (my daughter, my husband and I, at least) could be with the rest of the family on Thanksgiving. The logistics of traveling over 350 miles without a couple days off before and after the holiday made it impractical for us. Now that my husband and I live in Pasadena and my daughter in parts just a bit further south, we were able to join the rest of the family this year.

I've been on a gluten free diet for about a month now, ever since I read Wheat Belly by William Davis, M.D; there have been some interesting, positive results, too. My sister has a gluten allergy, so she is definitely off the stuff as well. I've been experimenting with various gluten free recipes, so I brought my cornbread stuffing and some pumpkin muffins, along with gluten free turkey gravy (thanks Trader Joe's!) to the feast.

Dad helping me at my table at the con

Los Con is held at the Los Angeles International Airport Marriott on the Friday, Saturday & Sunday after Thanksgiving. This year was my 3rd year in the dealer's room there. The last two years I've driven down on Wednesday and stayed through the Monday after with my dad. This year I still ended up staying at Dad's place for two nights, but since I only live about half an hour away from the venue I was able to drive home for the night on the other days. The con was a lot of fun, got to see some familiar faces and meet some new ones, too.

I didn't dress up on our first day, with setting up in the morning, I needed to wear comfortable clothes I could move easily in. That didn't stop me from dressing up on Saturday & Sunday, though: