This might be the new laziest post of all time. I'M TIRED. It's been sort of a rough week around here, to tell you the truth.
You know how on TV when the writers get lazy so they just do an episode that is made up of flashbacks of other episodes. THAT.
Except this is not nearly as good as TV. Because on TV you don't have to read. On the other hand, when you pull up Stranger there is no chance that you'll accidentally see an episode of Glee and watch the entire thing. And then spend the rest of the evening watching a marathon of The Glee Project, which is a reality show where they find the worst people who have ever been born on planet Earth and get them to compete against each other for a chance to win a guest spot on an episode of Glee. And then you won't be tempted to spend a good amount of time reading online forums about the contestants, and actually leave comments and engage in the debate about the worst reality show that is based on the worst show that has ever existed.
NOT THAT I'VE EVER DONE THAT. TWICE.
But about the flashbacks: I figure we could all use a very important reminder on this, Thanksgiving week, of how NOT to cook a turkey. Here is an email exchange from last Thanksgiving when I was living in Palau and it gives some pretty good tips.
And with that, I'll leave it to you: what is your funniest Thanksgiving memory?
~It Just Gets Stranger
One year my mom burned our kitchen down. It was tragic at the time but it's been a long time since it happened and now it's one of our family's funniest memories because our dad was really concerned about trying to save the turkey during all of it. (he was unsuccessful).
ReplyDeleteMy brother and I blew the door off the oven once because we tried to make OPA. Unwise.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.iris-hanlin.com
One year for thanksgiving my mom wanted to cook a dinner that didn't include the traditional turkey/stuffing/amazing deliciousness. I think she wanted to go with fish or something ridiculous. Anyway, my family pretty much threw a strike in protest. One day when she got so sick of our complaining, she very ominously said "you want a traditional thanksgiving dinner? Fine! I'll give you a traditional Thanksgiving dinner!"
ReplyDeleteAs an important side note to this story, you should know that my mom is a professional costumer and that year an opera company she worked for had put on the Crucible.
So down my mom goes to the opera company, and picks up all the costumes she had made. On Thanksgiving day she set up to massive tables out on our front lawn, and made all of us (including some extended family) dress up in colonial outfits and eat dinner out in our yard. My old neighbors still comment aout that day. It was 12 years ago.
Oh. My. Gosh.
DeleteIs your mom single, by chance?
We have themed Thanksgivings, basically we dress up and play games every year. My favorite memory is my grandmother dressed up in a long blond wig and cheer leading outfit with pompoms doing a cheer routine. Not everyday you see an 80 year old cheerleader.
ReplyDeleteI was arrested on my sister's front lawn, one Thanksgiving. I promise you... I'm a teacher... this is not as exciting as it sounds.
ReplyDeleteBasically, I moved, and there was a glitch at the DMV (they later admitted), which meant that while my address was changed on my license, it didn't quite save in the system, so important documents, such as emissions test warnings, were being sent to a previous address. I can only ASSUME that the lovely people living there (my best friend who moved in after me, I might add) didn't think that I needed the first or second or third or final notice, as she forwarded and mentioned NONE of them to me. This meant that after my unwillingness to get my car checked, my license was revoked.
So as a very short, heavy, disgruntled officer, who (one can only assume) has a small penis, sat in his car stewing about all the food he wasn't eating, decided to follow me for blocks, I knew something was up. Therefore, I followed all the procedures: rocking to a full stop, using my turning signals, the works.
He pulls me over in my sister's driveway, demands I exit my vehicle slowly, SCREAMS at my sister when she steps out and asks what's going on, slams me against my car, and cuffs me, claiming that the code that appeared said that my vehicle was suspected of being used in a crime. I didn't know about the emissions test, so I secretly made a pact to hunt down my ex and murder him, since he's the only person who ever drove my car with out me in it.
After printing me and taking my mug shot (while yelling at me for talking and then screaming at me for not answering him), he finally discovered his mistake and released me with a court date. I won't try to surprise you by withholding the fact that the judge immediately threw out my case when I brought the effing emissions test.
Two hours later, I return home, where everyone has eaten and the food was put away. I had to be driven home, since I didn't have my license, and that Monday, I had to tell my boss I was arrested to make sure the school didn't find out some other way.
It was HILARIOUS.
- Nicole (Naperville, IL)
Bless your heart.
DeleteThat is awful! I'm so sorry this happened to you.
DeleteYou got arrested and your family ate dinner WITHOUT you?? What were they thinking?! "Nicole just got body slammed by a cop in the front yard and hauled off to jail, but hey...turkey anyone??"
DeleteMy mom cooked every Thanksgiving, and every Thanksgiving at least one side dish bubbled over in the oven causing a smoky haze throughout the house. It was so bad one year, I passed around my daughter's asthma nebulizer and we all took hits off of it to help us breathe. My mom did not partake, nor did she see the humor in it.
ReplyDeleteMy aunt raised turkeys and we always had thanksgiving at her house. I snuck into the turkey pin when I was about 9 or 10 years old and Got attacked by one. It was like the queen of colors but in turkey form, the filthy beast. I made it out alive, barely.
ReplyDeleteThese stories are AMAZING.
ReplyDeleteSo a couple of years ago we were hosting a Thanksgiving and my WHOLE family was coming over. My mom and I spent days cooking and cleaning and by the time Thursday rolled around were grumpy and tired. So after finishing everything up and of course biting each others heads off, everyone came and we were trying to do our best to be happy and nice. I was getting pretty frustrated with my sisters (holiday cheer right?) and went to the fridge to get my bottle of pop. Unbeknownst to me, it had been knocked over and then put back in the fridge right before I went to get my drink. So here I am, grumpy, yelling something not so nice that I knew I shouldn't have been yelling, and I slam my bottle down onto the counter and open it. Of course, pop went EVERYWHERE. Then, after we finally all sat down and started eating our old folding table broke. Of course it was where 4 of the small kids were sitting and where we had just sat the stuffing and turkey. So all the beautiful stuffing and turkey fell on the floor, onto children, and some went flying around the already gross, sticky kitchen. Right about then my nephew started balling because his special turkey plate fell and broke and there was glass in his food. Another kid started screaming she didn't get stuffing. So all the adults are scurrying, moving food from their plates to the kids. Finally my mom just started cracking up and we all burst out laughing. It ended up being one of the funniest Thanksgivings ever that is now called the Great Turkey Disaster of 2011.
ReplyDeleteGood for you to find humor in it, reading it made me realize I would have just started crying... why oh WHY would someone put some many 'family' holidays in a row! Family is nice, for about 4 hours.
DeleteOne year, my grandmother (God rest her soul) who was not known for her cooking abilities made Thanksgiving dinner. She had this massive turkey, and she cooked it so long that as soon as she took it out of the oven it imploded. I guess the bones had gotten so dry that they disintegrated. My Dad dubbed it "Turkasaurus Collapsus!"
ReplyDeleteI think you're a closet Gleek ;)
ReplyDeleteLove the Glee Project... I mean... what?
ReplyDeleteI was a teenager when my baby sister Rachael had her November birthday fall on Thanksgiving Day. There were nine kids so birthdays to me seemed really special because it was that one day that was all about just you. My mom and dad always did a pretty awesome Thanksgiving spread. My mom prepared he Turkey, dressing and rolls and my dad made sides and desserts. My dad was a practical genius when it came to Meringue pies! Mmmm Lemon Meringue!!! So they never said anything about it being Rachael's birthday at all. Then after dinner as everyone was sprawled out semi-commatose with Turkey overdose, my dad came out of the kitchen with this gorgeous merigue pie and four tall slender candles sticking out of the top on fire. We all rushed to the table and sang happy birthday and someone took a picture of Rachael blowing the candles out. Her eyes were practically popping out of her head with wonder. Funny enough when the picture was develop there was some kind of over-glow and it looked like there were 8 candles on fire on the pie but she's clearly much younger than eight! It is still debated among family members because of the picture as to whether it was her fourth or eighth birthday that fell on Thanksgiving and we had pie instead of cake!
ReplyDeleteWe have 5 birthdays in Oct, so by the time Nov rolls around for my b-day. I get pie because we're all tired of cake.
DeleteMy funniest and by funny I mean weird Thanksgiving was when I was on my mission in Idaho Falls, ID. I was brand-new out of the MTC by a week and my companions had lined us up with four Thanksgiving dinners. Our appointments were at 11:30, 1:00, 3:00 and 6:00. I'm pretty sure they were hazing me or something because my companions told me I had to eat like I was starving at every meal so I wouldn't offend anyone. Then when they would pass me something at the table they would say, "You should try some of this!" and whisper "You don't want to hurt anyone's feeling do you?" I swear I thought I would never eat again after the first two meals. And then the third appointment came and I am not kidding it was the first time that day I had seen any olives on the table. Weird huh? Aren't olives a standard Thanksgiving relish tray item? Of the four appointments, that was the ONLY place I got to eat olives. At home, we always opened two cans of black olives but you were only allowed to get enough for each finger on one hand! When I expressed delight at seeing olives, my companions and the members we were eating with kept pressing me to have more and I think I ate enought for all my fingers and toes. No, I did not put them on my fingers and toes before eating them! I think I may have eaten the whole can by myself. I was so sick later but the olives were to me the best part of the day! I have never eaten so much or felt sooo sick from Thanksgiving EVER before or after!
ReplyDeleteI have never heard of eating olives at Thanksgiving! Or a "relish tray." Maybe it's a regional thing?
DeleteI doubt it's regional. My southern grandma has always put olives out for thanksgiving. We live in the Pacific Northwest.
DeleteI don't have amazing thanksgiving stories. But I do know someone who was on the second season of The Glee Project. I've never watched that stupid show, but your description of people who go on it is pretty accurate.
ReplyDeleteOkay, she wasn't terrible, but she did have a too-big ego, too much attitude, and not enough talent to back it all up.
THIS Thanksgiving. My brother and his wife and their one-year-old daughter (whom I hadn't yet met) picked me up and we drove 9 or 10 hours last weekend to spend the week with my widowed-and-orphaned father and HIS (also orphaned-) brother. The drive in is fine, the baby is wonderful, the family is family; everything's as expected. Thursday rolls around and my sister-in-law, who has NEVER "done" a turkey dinner before, goes out to the kitchen with me and we get started. She's also the only member of the household who has any interest in football, poor thing. She didn't get to watch any (she may have gotten to listen a little while we were cooking). But I had only consumed a single cup of coffee that morning and had NO appetite the entire time we're filling the house with delicious smells, and she's having chills due to the low-grade fever she's got.
ReplyDeleteThe meal is ready at lunch time; my father goes in to make gravy (that was always his specialty) and discovers he's got NO flour. The Scottish next-door neighbors aren't home, because why would they be? The American neighbor on the other side also isn't - he's probably at someone else's feast. So we have "au jus" in our gravy boat rather than gravy. We sit; we eat; everything's really lovely. We completely skipped blessing the food or saying what we're thankful for, or even giving thanks (beyond the menfolk thanking the womenfolk for doing the cooking)! And there are no olives in the relish tray - they're still in the jar in the fridge. Not that we bothered with a relish tray - we ate at lunch time; no time for healthy snacking!
Then the pumpkin cheesecake comes out - and I rush to the bathroom to hurl all the nutrients I've managed to consume that day! Yay for being around a new-for-me infant who's obviously given me some lovely new bug! Yay for missing out on Turkey Day dessert! Yay for yakking again in the middle of the night (dry heaves that time) and being awakened by my brother having similar food-ejection issues THREE TIMES through the night! Yay for having to drive 9 - 10 hours home on Friday! With a van load of puny-feeling people!
Okay, I realize it's not all that funny. I'm hoping that by posting it, it WILL be funny in the not-so-distant future. Daddy and HIS brother never got sick; only the travelers, with our low-grade fevers and our rumbly tumblies. And we didn't even pack any leftovers for the trip!
My funniest Thanksgiving was the time my parents "cooked" up the idea to fool my younger brother. They set the table with all the normal fixings and then presented the cooked bird...a Cornish Game Hen. It was on a big platter just like a big turkey would be. The look on his face was priceless! After the initial shock they pulled the real bird out of the oven and we all had a good laugh and a wonderful meal!
ReplyDelete