May your turkey be moist, your casseroles be done, leftovers be few, and your family and friends be many. We will have the first Thanksgiving dinner today with the family. Thursday, I am going to take Cleo and Dad to a casino. Cleo has not been to one in nearly four years. Next Sunday we will have another gathering with family and food. Justin is fixing something special, and I can hardly wait to see what it is. Both my sons got their culinary skills from their mother and are great cooks.

If you don't have the funds to feed your family a special dinner, or are alone, please consider going to one of the free dinners around. That's why they are there.

I bought a live trap the other day and it came with a bonus politicians’ trap. It said for squirrels and rats.

After six weeks of frustration with Optimum, I stopped at the office in Enid on Friday. At first, the lady thought she just had another gripey guy, but after a little flirting and a bad joke or two she scheduled us a technician for Monday just to get me gone. Sunday, Cleo got a call from someone at Optimum saying the appointment had been canceled, and if the channels weren't back on in two weeks, call back.

I called back on Tuesday and after the bad words I planned to use on the unlucky phone answer-er had passed, I got a guy in the Caribbean that told me he would stay until we had it figured out. After 15 minutes of trying things, he said uncle. He said there would be a technician here on Wednesday to work on it. After the repairman checked several things, and made some adjustments, Cleo's missing channels returned. I didn't get his name, but if you know the Optimum guy, please tell him many thanks from Cleo for his help.

There was only one side to the story on an Alva Facebook site about a lady that had problems with her car, and the guy that helped her took her money and left her alone. Someone recognized the man, and that part of the story I can believe. She told the police about it, and they supposedly laughed and told her she was in a bad side of town. I could not find it again to digest it all, but I would like to hear the rest of the story from all sides.

Bad side of town? Like all the druggies live on a certain block, the weeds are higher some spots, there is more clutter in an area, the police don't patrol so much there? Besides, I have my doubts our officers would tell anyone that when someone was having trouble. More likely they would do whatever it took to get them back on the road.

To the lady that this all happened to. If you are new to Alva, please be advised, this is not the norm for our town. Most people will go out of their way to help.

Happy holidays, all! Let's all be safe out there and God bless.