By William M. Dowd
Which of these things is not like the other?
If you guessed the one in the feathered hat, you’re wrong. It’s the two animate objects, not the inanimate map, flocking together.
This occurred to me as I was watching the BBC News on cable TV tonight. I like the channel because the British Broadcasting Co. is head-and-shoulders above U.S. commercial and “public” television in providing a broad look at the news of the world and putting it in some kind of perspective with deep reporting and insightful analysis. Most of the time.
On this particular evening, the newscaster — a Brit based in Washington, D.C. — couldn’t restrain himself when it came to making fun of an American custom: the annual presidential pardon for a turkey just before Thanksgiving.
This year the freed bird will range down to Florida to, I am not making this up, serve as grand marshal for a Thanksgiving parade at DisneyWorld in Orlando.
The newscaster got his jollies over all this. I agree it’s a particularly stupid thing, and can’t imagine how it came about — unless it had something to do with a poultry industry PR gimmick.
But that doesn’t give a foreign guest to our shores license to poke fun at our current gallant leader and our favorite holiday food. England has some pretty odd customs, too, and most of them involve a certain Queen Elizabeth II. I don’t mean to be nasty, mind you, but it took her years to master The Royal Wave she uses at public gatherings. A parade grand marshal does the same thing, but the turkey didn’t need to be made ruler of a nation to do so.
Obviously, she doesn’t serve as much purpose as a tasty turkey and costs a lot more per pound.
Need proof? The turkey breast I bought this year cost $2.67 a pound. The queen, even after you take away all her freebie perks like rent and staff and travel and clothes and other goodies, is conservatively worth $3.2 million a pound.
(Posted 11/20/07)
William M. Dowd is a Capital Region writer and photographer specializing in food, drink and destinations at Dowd’s Guides.