Today is the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States, one of the the major holidays for family get-togethers. (Another big one is Christmas.) One year, it was our family’s turn to host Thanksgiving, and when that happens, it means that the kitchen is overrun by relatives cooking all the dishes and hunting through the cabinets and drawers of an unfamiliar kitchen. One year, I learned that a pastry blender can be used as a potato masher and that a cheese planer can be used as a pie server. This is what happens when other people use your kitchen. It could also mean that my kitchen has too many froofy gadgets. Nadine Kano, best known to geeks as the author of Developing International Software for Windows 95 and Windows NT, also has a pastry degree from Le Cordon Bleu, graduating at the top of her class. She corrected me: “One can never have too many froofy kitchen gadgets.” Nadine has since retired from Microsoft to start her own consulting firm and be a pastry chef on the side.

(Actually, the fact that my relatives were using a pastry blender as a potato masher and a cheese planer as a pie server suggests that I don’t have enough froofy gadgets. Specifically, I’m missing a potato masher and a pie server.)