A few years back my wife and I were traveling on business in Brazil over Thanksgiving. A professor my wife was working with took us and several of the students to a churrascaria for dinner on Thanksgiving. (A churrascaria is a restaurant where servers roam around the restaurant with skewers of various cooked meats, continually stopping at each table to carve off some to everyone at the table) While there I mentioned that it was the US holiday of Thanksgiving and described it to the professor and the Brazilian students in general terms: get together with family and/or friends and have a large meal together, and described the "traditional" Thanksgiving meal. I was merely trying to make conversation, and make the point that what we were doing was pretty similar to the Thanksgiving tradition. However the professor responded "I'll see what I can do" and flagged the head waiter over, and spoke to him in rapid Portuguese. The waiter responded to us "We don't have any turkey but I'll see what we can do." and disappeared into the kitchen. About 10 minutes later he emerged from the kitchen followed by a server carrying a large skewer of meat, he presented it to us with a big beaming smile saying "This is as close as we could get to turkey. It's Ostrich." It didn't taste even a little like turkey, but it was delicious.

I started putting meat in my stuffing a year ago. What a difference it makes. I make a plain jane bread stuffing, but add the meat from six hot Italian sausages to it. I fry it up, crumbling it up. (remove it from the casing first). Once the bird is stuffed, I put thick sliced bacon all over the top of the bird and put it in the oven, covered. I uncover the last 1/2 hour to 45 minutes to brown the bacon. Remove the bacon then crumble it finely. In the meantime, leave the bird in the oven and it'll brown nicely. When you take the stuffing out of the bird, mix in the crumbled bacon. I also add cranberries to the stuffing. One of the guys I work with told me his sister did this so I tried it for Christmas and it was an instant hit. You would think the spices from the sausages would over power the 'normal' dressing spices, but it actually enhanced them, with a tiny kick. Even people who don't like spicey would eat it, I'm sure.

BTW, when I needed an extraction before an implant, I had the periodontist do it. They do extractions all day, every day, and they are better equipped to notice and react to a possible emergency. When I was in fifth grade, my friend, who had some serious health problems, died in the dentist's chair. One day she was in class and the next day she wasn't. Joan was the first person, besides my grandfather, that I knew who died. And while I realize, gratefully, that I don't have her health situation, I still take this stuff seriously. Attitude toward teeth is also partly cultural. Where I'm from, teeth are preserved (or if necessary, replaced) at all costs, even if the work has to be paid off slowly. Other places I've traveled, no one seems to think anything is odd about missing teeth, even if they are in the front. (Although did you see the Tiger King follow-up? That guy with all the missing teeth had them replaced. The difference was startling!)

I had it several times when in SE Asia. Sometimes I purchased it at the open markets while watching the vendor process the giant fruit; other times I bought it already packaged in the grocery stores. It was one of my favorites of the 'new to me' fruits I tried while in Asia, although it does have a slight smell of decay. Not as bad as durian, and I found it easy to overlook, but those with sensitive noses might find it offputting.