Thanksgiving is underrated and I am here to tell you why

As the title suggests, Thanksgiving is underrated and I am here to tell you why.

Now, I realize you might be thinking, “Thanksgiving is great. Why could you call it underrated?” The answer is because it should be rated even higher than it is. I might be a little biased. After all, I spent many years wrestling and Thanksgiving tended to coincide with the beginning of wrestling season. So in some ways, Thanksgiving was my “last supper.” I would cut weight for Thanksgiving like it was a wrestling tournament. So maybe I hold the holiday in higher regard than others since it was always the last good memory before three and a half months of self-induced anorexia. But I think there are other good reasons too and I am here to give you my takes — some of which are hotter than others.

The “Seeing My Family is Stressful” Trope is Overrated and Outplayed

When you’re a kid, hanging out with your family kind of sucks. You don’t really have any autonomy, you have to sit around telling people how school is or what kind of homework you have, you’re not allowed to drink, and you don’t even understand most of the best jokes.

As an adult, hanging out with your family has some perks. You can kind of do whatever you want, you get to gossip about family members who are not there, you can drink as much as you want, and a lot of the time you don’t even have to pay for it.

Now, for some people, there is the reverse effect. True — life grows more complicated as you age, and seeing your family can become stressful if people are arguing, asking you about politics, or other things like why do you have a cat. But there’s simple answers to all of these questions. People arguing? Have a drink and laugh. Kaepernick should stand during the national anthem? Play both sides — he has a right to do whatever he wants, but it’s a polarizing form of protest. Why do you have a cat? I don’t have a good answer for that one. But end of day, if seeing your family stresses you out, then guess what? You don’t have to go! That’s the nice thing about Thanksgiving: no one makes the rules about who gets to do it and with whom. When you’re an adult, you get to make your own decisions, and in my book, if you’re complaining about your decisions, you’re not making good ones.

People Who Do Thanksgiving at Night Make No Sense

I never understood why this is a thing. The beauty of Thanksgiving is that it is an all-day affair/coma. You start early, you get the first round of football games in, maybe you get to dessert by the second wave of games, and then you just let your belly breathe for the rest of the day until you’re hungry again at 8pm and all get Chinese food together. I mean that sounds pretty awesome to me on paper. Why would you wait all day doing nothing just to get the party started during the last round of football games? Saints/Falcons? I get it’s an NFC South matchup but c’mon. Plus nothing is open all day. What do people even do all day if they’re not doing Thanksgiving until 7 or 8pm. I don’t get it. Those people should have a different holiday, it’s honestly a disservice to the tradition.

People Who Boycott Columbus Day Should Boycott Thanksgiving or They’re Hypocrites in My Book

Sorry to get political in this blog but I couldn’t resist. Yes, on one hand I think if we judged people without placing them in the historical context of their era that we might find flaws with pretty much every aspect of human history. I also agree that Christopher Columbus wasn’t exactly a great guy and that our American history classes often wrongly celebrate us straight up taking land from Native Americans.

But this blog isn’t about taking sides. This blog is about being intellectually consistent. And if you think that the systemic patriarchal demonic white men got on ships and came to the US and poisoned the native people to death with pox blankets and wrongfully stole their land, then I don’t understand how in the next breath you can cozy up with your relatives to celebrate the time they said, “LOLZ, sorry, here is a token of our appreciation for you” the very next day. These were literally the same exact people. So if you hate these people and don’t want to celebrate them for one holiday (because your job doesn’t give you a day off?), you’re a flat out hypocrite to enjoy when you get not one but TWO days off for the day that celebrates pretty much the same exact thing. Deal with it.

It’s Time for the NFL to Stop Airing the Cowboys and Lions

Two different reasons here.

In the Cowboys’ case, we’re feeding into this whole “America’s Team” nonsense that ended more than 20 years ago. Is everyone watching the same Cowboys team I’ve watched for my entire adult life? They have a Satanic owner that everyone hates, they choke bigger and harder than everyone, and the “Tony Romo is an elite quarterback” story is just as much of a myth as the resistance was in France. Let’s please for the love of god stop feeding the egos of their owner and their fanbase and get them off of television.

As for the Lions, they’re the Lions. I figure maybe we’re throwing them a bone because living in Detroit is probably not that great, but that game is guaranteed to be awful pretty much every year unless they put two toilet bowl teams together.

Gravy is Always Left off of the “Best Food on Thanksgiving” List and I’m Here to Defend Gravy’s Honor

Whenever one of these lesser blogs puts out their Thanksgiving hit piece, they always list the top 5 things to eat during Thanksgiving and let people debate between stuffing, mashed potatoes, turkey, peas (lol jk), etc. Their “hot take” is always that turkey isn’t very high on the list, as if anyone is surprised that a plain ‘ole turkey breast might play second fiddle to Apple Pie or meat stuffing (re: idiots). What is always omitted on this list is gravy. In my book, gravy is the sun and everything else on Thanksgiving is just a planet orbiting around the gravy. You literally put it on everything (except dessert, unless you’re a weirdo). You can’t tell me that you think your turkey or your mashed potatoes or your stuffing are half as exciting to you just raw dogging them without the gravy. Gravy makes all of them better. Gravy is like Tom Brady and mashed potatoes, stuffing, and turkey (and whatever else you’re throwing gravy on) are like Wes Welker, Julian Edelman, and Troy Brown. Just every day “give it your all” guys who are made better by the G.O.A.T.

At last year’s Thanksgiving, we had absolutely everything. We had a regular turkey and a deep fried turkey that was set outdoors in the crisp autumn air in a deep fryer. We had a room for the kids, a football room for the adults, we had homemade beer, we even had a vegetable and cheese plate that was designed to look like a turkey! Then the main course came around and I was casually informed there would be no gravy. I wasn’t sure if I was more insulted by lack of gravy or the nonchalant manner in which I was informed it would not be there. I wasn’t sure if it would be rude for me to get in a car and find the closest 7/11 to at least get some microwavable form of gravy. Unfortunately, there’s no feedback form when you do your family Thanksgiving, but there is social media, so let’s hope that I am actually invited back next year after this blog goes live.

Not As Hot a Take but Dessert Also Gets a Tough Go At It

Honest question, how often do you eat pie? When you get to be old like me (31) you can’t really just casually have pie. I think there’s a statistic out there that every slice of pie costs you 10 hours in the gym or something like that. It’s a depressing statistic and I feel like it can’t possibly be true, probably perpetrated by the Thanksgiving Gestapo (e.g., people who sell gym memberships the next day), but I am not here to research facts. Just to write blogs. And so I feel like on Thanksgiving you get a free pass for all the best pies: blueberry, apple, pecan, pumpkin, rhubarb, strawberry — you name it! Throw a dab of vanilla ice cream on there. LFG!!! I’m sorry, but I’m not buying it that Dessert isn’t #2 on this list. At least not when you’re an adult. Maybe when you’re a little kid and you get to eat dessert all the time, it’s just another day in the life. Not so when each slice of pie feels like five pounds.

 

And that’s about it for now. No matter how you celebrate Thanksgiving — whether you’re a political hypocrite or you have no guts and think stuffing is #1 — I hope you enjoy it. Just be nice to your family, if you can.