November
26, 2003
Today is the day to get drunk at lunch.
Not everybody loves everything about Thanksgiving. Read below for examples!
To make this site even more splendid, view it through here. Have a jolly good Thanksgiving!
What Should Be Taken Off (Or Put On) the Thanksgiving Menu
Rob Theakston:
1. I'd elminate the hassle of having to deal with racist relatives that may
or may not be affiliated with an organization that thinks donning sheets and
lighting crosses is the new black. No pun intended.
2. I grow tired of having to eat dinner at 2pm to pacify all of the geriatric members in my immediate family.
3. I would eliminate the fact that whenever my grandmother serves thanksgiving dinner she still purchases (equates the word soft drink with) cans of TAB soda.
4. I would eliminate the need for my cousins to listen to Toby Keith or watch Country Music Television during the festive occasion.
Tyson Tune:
I love Christmas more than Turkey-day, so I like to celebrate by making my
special egg-nog of Bourbon and ice cubes.
Melissa Springer:
What part of Thanksgiving would I eliminate? Family.
Mine consists almost entirely of passive-aggressive, alcoholic, chain-smoking WASPs (with a few overtly aggressive Catholics thrown in for good measure). This incident circa 1996 is exemplary of our holidays together: Nana has not been eating much all day, but she's been putting away the Scotch like nobody's business. A day of drinking culminates at the Thanksgiving dinner table, where she clutches a napkin to her mouth and runs from the room, vomiting as she goes. The table falls silent. My mother, good WASPy daughter that she is, says, "Oh, it must be her new medicine making her sick." To which my Irish-Catholic uncle responds, "Medicine, my ass! It's all the Scotch she's been drinking!" I wanted to laugh, but the thick blanket of cigarette smoke in the room made me cry.
This year, I will be spending the holidays with friends.
Tracy Lyons:
Yes yes, the usual vegetarian gripe about the turkey being this big ol' centerpiece
to the meal and everything, yes everything, must revolve around the turkey.
Turkey juices in the stuffing, strange looks from relatives when you don't
put gravy on your mashed potatoes, and the threat of disownment at the suggestion
of a nice "un-turkey" at next year's feast. My first few years as
a vegetarian were spent trying to convert every meat eater in my life to the
wonderful world of fruits and vegetables as sustainable fare. At thanksgiving
I would go into hyper-drive and as the turkey was being prepared I would hand
out facts about the way that turkeys are treated during their life and the
details of the slaughter. If that didn't turn some heads, I would chat it
up about all the hormones and antibiotics in said meat. While family members
enjoyed tender morsels I would whisper "gobble gobble" in a piteous
voice hoping to get a little sympathy out of them. And if none of that worked,
I would grab the giblets (grossest things on earth, by the way) and make them
dance around the table, singing like a broadway star on coke. This always
got a few laughs, but never the desired effect of tears and apologies and
promises that next year, yes, we would indeed be serving "un-turkey"
because my performance had been THAT convincing. Eventually Igave up on converting
the ones that I love. realizing how horrid my singing giblet routine really
is, Ihave now turned my attention to converting those that I hate.
John Hansen:
I did Thanksgiving last month here in Canada (we're weird that way. Don't
ask me when Christmas is.) To this day, despite liking cranberry juice, I
just feel that cranberries themselves have no place on my Thanksgiving table.
Bring on the turkey, the gravy, the potatoes, squash, the stuffing, the pumpkin
pies. But cranberries are like that awkward guy who comes to a party alone.
He makes an honest but stilted attempt to socialise, maybe he even talks to
a girl or two, but he never really seems to fit in. He just sits in a corner
alone and gets drunk until he decides to go home. Then, with his departure,
the air of awkward tension at the party is dispelled and can continue in a
more relaxed state. That's what cranberries are like.
Now a Thanksgiving meal that consists solely of stuffing and pumpkin pie? I'd be thankful for that.
Kid Nougat:Eliminate the Thanksgiving Day Dress Code – that’s what I say!
Seriously… Is there anything worse that sitting down to a meal where you’re about to scarf down twice your weight in turkey and whatnot - while sporting lame-o dress pants and a belt? A belt! What kind of thick-witted ding-dong wears a belt to a pig-out? WILL SOMEBODY PLEASE ANSWER THAT?
Also, I’d eliminate those turkeys kids make in school when they trace their hands. So five minutes ago.
John DiMase:
Thanksgiving has so many good attributes, as I see it, though they seem
to have come into being despite most of what I think were the holiday's original
means used for it's genesis, it's evolution towards the commercial entity
it is today, good attributes seemingly at odds with the history that the day
parades in.
I would get rid of either the good things, such as togetherness, family, cooperation,
culinary appreciation, days off from work, or I would get rid of the things
not all that praiseworthy, like the native americans offering help to those
in need only to be used and taken advantage of and eventually evicted from
their land and history, the commercial and retail ties the holiday shamelessyl
uses to promote itself by inflating a humble rememberence day into an advertising
super-day, the pressure for increased productivity right after daylight savings,
the Romanesque gorging oneself into a torpir further and further towards unhealthy
weight, the stress and headaches spawned from a night with relatives you don't
get along with to set a good example for children who will only learn from
your suffering and not from your family loyalty.
Getting rid of the good aspects leaves only the bastardized celebratoin of
the rape and brutalization of an indigenious people at the hands of yet another
group of religious fanatics in the name of their God and faith. Left to parade
around without good or constructive traits, the hypoicrytical and piecemeal
leftover holiday would be as attractive as Margot Kidder the third day she
was wandering through the backyards of her peers without sanity or teeth,
except without the sad but understandable reasons for being that way, and
without Jay leno making a joke about it. I think that the less then laudible
things that would be left would not be able to stand the scrutinization or
attention it woiuld find itself under, fading out within a decade.
But getting rid of the pretense of history and sharing that are used to connect
the past with present day themes of togetherness, appreciation for what we
have, and connecting again to loved ones, seperating the sales at Lord and
Taylor from the dinner with grandma and gramps, would leave something entirely
different.Without the build-up on news shows and talk shows, without the turkey
sales or locked work doors, the holiday would have less credit due it for
some people having nothing better to do that day then abuse their relatives
with their presence. The only ones, maybe, who would be together having dinner
and giving thanks to chance or a diety, might just be the ones who really
wanted to and appreciated being with family or friends enough to treat them
right. That kind of tradition would pass itself down without need for advertising
or slogans, it would find purchase in hearts and become tradition nonetheless,
but without as much pressure or drinking to escape familial proximity.
Oh no! Wait!
Screw that.
I would get rid of those big scary cartoon character shaped balloons and the
televisoin coverage that brings them into my house to frighten me no matter
how I try to run and hide under the pile of clothes in my closet.
I would replace them with month old white kitten holding red rose buds in
their mouths.
Who would miss the huge and forbidding animated friends turned soul stealing
floating demons?
Not me.
And take Kelly, for good measure, but leave Regis, someone has to kiss the
asses of rich people since Rosie left TV.
Right?
Chris Monks:
I’d eliminate the false accusations and name calling. It’s not like
I beg to do the mashed potatoes every year. If I had my choice I’d choose
another dish, because quite frankly, I’m sick of Aunt Vivian’s nitpicking.
Does anyone else care if I boil the potatoes instead of bake them, or if I
use unsalted instead of salted butter? I think not. And if they do they should
let me know; I’m not clairvoyant or anything. Damn.
Sam Forsyth:
Thanksgiving means so little to me. I grew up poor and usually all I had
to be thankful for was my aunt's house and a lot of food once a year. These
days the only thing I cherish about this day is that I can once again use
my old joke about two weeks before:
"Man, I can't wait for Thanksgiving. I'm so hungry!"
David Anthony:
I’d like to substitute my cousin's presence at Thanksgiving for Katey
Sagal from television. My cousin talks about himself and his marketing coordinator
job incessantly. Those stories were good the first time you heard them, four
years ago, but I bet Katey Sagal would have stories that I have not heard
before. I would ask her about Futurama and what it was like to act on a cartoon
and did she get along with the other actors and what was Al Gore’s daughter
like (besides just her looks). She’s also married to a guy named Jack
White (and I would totally ask her about Meg and wait to for her to get it,
while my cousin would be like "Who?").
Plus, you know how on TV, whenever people exit a helicopter and they squat
down real low to walk? I used to hate that, thinking to myself "that
rotor is like ten feet off the ground." Well, not anymore: Mrs. Sagal’s
father, Boris Sagal, was a noted director who died on May 22, 1981, on the
set for "World War III" when his head was hit with a helicopter
rotor. While my family has not lost loved ones in such extraordinary circumstances,
but, knowing Katey’s experiences and after watching Katey openly discuss
the tragic loss of co-star John Ritter during an interview with Entertainment
Tonight, I know she is just the person to open a frank dialogue with my family
on dealing with our own losses this year. And that is the second reason that
I would like to substitute her for my cousin at this year's Thanksgiving dinner.
.
Cynthia Smith:
I don't give a shit about turkey. Why do people like turkey? It's bland bland
bland. Good food has flavor, turkey is like eating cellulose that has been
soaked in watered down chicken bullion. No point. For this, my first time
cooking a Thanksgiving meal, I wanted to do a stuffed pork tenderloin, or
maybe some sort of shrimp something. But guests insisted on turkey, and I
am nothing if not hospitable.
I saw an ad for the Popeye's deep-fried Cajun Turkey - that sounds pretty
good. But no, here I am with some yuppified free-range turkey from Whole Paycheck.
Thanks, NYTimes editorial page for that idea.
We're going to brine it or some shit, hopefully give it some
semblance of flavor before stuffing it full of apples and baking the sumbitch.
Let's all cross our fingers that it's edible, and that the gravy isn't lumpy
so I can drown it in something appetizing.
Thank God for sweet potato casserole and pecan pie, is all I'm saying.