Thanksgiving began like any other holiday, full of hope and enthusiasm that the day would be filled with harmony and laughter. I envisioned myself in my moo-cow apron greeting our guests as they arrive with a spring in my step and a smile on my face. The fireplace would be softly glowing, the turkey would be done to perfection and everyone would be in awe as they sat around my exquisitely decorated table – Not!

My idealistic little bubble burst about 7 a.m., when Martha Stewart entered the picture. I’m not saying that Martha ruined my Thanksgiving, but she certainly didn’t help matters any.

To explain how the events transpired, I began working full time and consequently my husband, Mike, who is a rancher and is able to spend more time at home, began taking over a lot of the cooking responsibilities. As with anything else he does, he can’t just do a so-so job to get by, he has to research, study, and completely engulf himself in a project including cooking.

In the past few months, I have sampled everything from apple pear compost to cow cow yuk. His cooking really began to improve though when he discovered the Food Network on TV a few weeks ago. With the help of Emeril, Wolf Gang Puck and yes, Martha Stewart, he has been making absolutely delicious meals every night.

Now you may ask, how could this possibly be a problem?

Well, up until Thanksgiving morning, it wasn’t. I woke up that morning singing and dancing my way to the kitchen as usual … okay, so I’m not a morning person. I dragged my weary carcass into the kitchen and began to prepare the turkey.

Normally Mike has learned not to talk to me for the first 30 minutes upon rising, because even though I’m up and mobile, until I’m fully awake, nothing good comes out of my mouth. But for some reason he broke that unspoken rule and said, “Are you sure you should be rinsing out the turkey cavity like that? Martha Stewart says there are a lot of good juices in there that you want to keep.”

Now, I really try hard to suppress my innate morning crankiness, but come on, Martha Stewart? So between clenched teeth, I not so politely said, “I’ve been cooking turkeys for just as many years as Martha Stewart and nobody’s complained yet!”

Quieted for a little while, he continued to observe my unrefined culinary prowess, as I not so gently, due to my agitated state, slapped the bird around the sink. I almost lost the big buzzard at one point when it slipped out of my hands and scurried across the kitchen counter.

I saved it from landing on the floor with a hip to cabinet move, at which point Mike cried, “Fowl, unnecessary roughness!” It would have been funny, if he hadn’t followed up with, “I’ve never seen Martha handle a bird that way, I don’t think it’s a good thing.”

I don’t have anything personal against the Susie Homemaker of TV land, but she was really beginning to get on my nerves as Mike continued to offer Martha’s words of wisdom.

The final blow came when I was preparing the stuffing and Mike said, “Martha says you should stuff the neck cavity first and cook the turkey with the breast side down but that’s okay, don’t feel bad, because she says everyone usually does it wrong.”

I picked up the turkey shoved it at Mike and said, “Here, you and Martha can stuff it!”

At that point I decided that I wanted nothing more to do with the bird, and with an air of satisfaction, I stomped out of the kitchen.

Fortunately for the guests, Mike did stuff it and cook it, and the turkey turned out beautifully. By the time dinner was ready, I was beginning to wonder if maybe Martha did know something, but I wasn’t about to admit it.

We had one other run in with Martha during the day when it came time to make the gravy. I’ve always made gravy with flour, but Mike said, “Martha recommends making it with corn starch.”

I replied, “Well if you know how to make gravy Martha’s way go right ahead.” So he proceeded to get out the ingredients, looked at the pan, looked at me and then made a dive for the cookbook. Need I say which one – “Cooking With Martha.”

Upon examining her recipe for gravy, he asked me to read it because he didn’t understand one of the directions. “I replied,”Don’t ask me, I make gravy with flour.”

Then after about 10 minutes of discussing the virtues of using corn starch or flour, butter or pan drippings, and whether or not Martha knows diddily squat, our good friend Doug, who was joining us for dinner, tired of our gravy exchanges. “Good grief, I’ll show you both how to make the gravy,” he said. And he did – some of the best gravy we have ever had.

After dinner, and the guests had departed, Mike and I recounted the day’s events and decided that we may be on to something here.

Next year we could wait until Doug came over to start the turkey and get him to cook that as well! Mike says, “Heck, I’ll bet we could pick an argument about the yams and mashed potatoes too!”

As Martha would say, this really could be “a good thing.”