Visions of Ham Catastrophes

The week was crazy and quite frankly left me feeling a little bit like I might make a good Proverbs 31 woman. Besides having one of the busiest operative case loads of any week since I started working I also cooked enough ham to feed 40 people for Thanksgiving dinner, hosted a visiting missionary from Uganda and then had a bunch of people over for Sunday lunch. It feels a little bit like being a hamster running on one of those wheels except the wheel seems to be spinning just a little bit faster than you can run.

My church had a potluck Thanksgiving meal. After signing up to bring the ham, I then panicked and realized that I had no idea how to prepare it and maybe shouldn't be venturing into such an endeavor when 40 people would be able to witness the disastrous results. First of all, I had no idea how much ham I needed to feed that number of people. After 20 minutes of staring at the pile of ham at the grocery store, I finally decided to lose all pride and find some grandmotherly looking person and ask her how much to buy. Fortunately the random grandmotherly person I encountered was full of wise advise regarding how much to buy although I think she thought it a bit strange to be stopped by some desperate random stranger asking such things.

I then realized that I had no clue how to go about preparing it for consumption. After looking up several very conflicting internet recipes, I broke down and got more advice, this time from a grandmotherly appearing lady in the hospital where I was doing rounds. She was full of sage advice regarding ham preparation, and didn't stop talking about it until well after she had exceeded my attention span.

Fortunately, the ham turned out OK and there was exactly the right amount. So on this Thanksgiving weekend, I am thankful that I avoided a ham catastrophe. I am also thankful for my church and the opportunity to have people to share ham with. That being said, I may sign up to bring the rolls next year....