Third Time Lucky

we are now forced to watch MTV 2. Nathan knows all the songs and sings along with them. Most of them have dirty words that have been bleeped out, but Nathan sings them anyway.

1:00 p.m.

The food is served. We begin eating.

1:15 p.m.

We finish eating.

1:20 p.m.

I help Mrs. Gianini clean up. She says not to be ridiculous and that I should go and 'have a nice gossip' with Claire.

It is frightening, if you think about it, how clueless old people can be sometimes.

Instead of going to have a nice gossip with Claire, I stay where I am and tell Mrs. Gianini how much I am enjoying having her son live with us. Mr. G is very good about helping around the house and has even taken over my old job

of cleaning the toilets. Not to mention the thirty-six-inch TV, pinball machine and football table he brought with him when he moved in.

Mrs. Gianini is immensely gratified to hear this, you can just tell. Old people like to hear nice stuff about their kids, even if their kid, like Mr. Gianini, is thirty-nine-and-a-half years old.

3:00 p.m.

We have to leave if we are going to beat the traffic home. I say goodbye. Claire does not say goodbye back to me, but Nathan does. He advises me to keep it real. Mrs. Gianini gives us a lot of leftover turkey. I thank her, even though I don't eat turkey, being a vegetarian and am virulently opposed to the mass slaughter of helpless fowls every time a holiday rolls around.

6:30 p.m.

We finally make it back into the city, after spending three and a half hours in bumper-to-bumper traffic along the

Long Island Expressway. Though there is nothing very express about it, if you ask me.

I barely have time to change into my baby-blue, floor-length Armani sheath dress and matching ballet fiats before

the limo honks downstairs and Lars, my bodyguard, arrives to escort me to my second Thanksgiving dinner.

7:30 p.m.

 Arrive at the Plaza Hotel. I am greeted by the concierge, who announces I me to the masses assembled in the Palm Court:

'Presenting Her Royal Highness Princess Amelia Mignonette Grimaldi Thermopolis Renaldo.'

God forbid he should just say Mia.