Tag: Thanksgiving

Happy Turkey Day

Here are some happy turkeys.

Here in New England, it is not uncommon to come across roving flocks of wild turkeys. I came across these guys a couple years ago while heading to a nearby farm to buy some eggs. (Chicken eggs, mind you.) They were in the long winding driveway, and as I drove up, they just kept running ahead, seemingly reluctant to spend the extra energy to get over the towering snowbanks. (That was the winter of Too Much Winter.) All the way at the top of the hill, they figured I was in it for the long chase, and took flight.

thanks accepted here

Speaking of ambiguity…

This was a sign outside a local catering/takeout business I came across a few weeks ago. It made my day. (And I swear I that this was the way I found it. No punctuation marks were stolen in the creation of this image.)

gobble, gobble, gobble

turkey_6.pngToday is Thanksgiving, a holiday here in the US traditionally (or at least moderately traditionally) celebrated by a day of feasting with family and by expressing thanks. It’s also a day when most Americans eat turkey, a large bird that is native to North America.¹ This has lead to many people calling Thanksgiving “Turkey Day.” So what better Themed Things list to bring you for this Turkey Day than a list of turkeys. (However, these are turkeys you won’t likely see at the dinner table.²)

Ten Turkey Things for Turkey Day

  1. Turkey in the Straw: an American folk song, often fiddled. (Listen to it, if you like.)
  2. hand turkey: a picture made by tracing one’s hand to make the approximate shape of a turkey. The thumb represents the head and neck, and the fingers the tail feathers. Usually, the drawing is adorned with a beak, an eye, wings and a wattle.
  3. a turkey: a movie that got bad reviews, or that otherwise was poorly received.
  4. a turkey: a bowling term meaning 3 consecutive strikes.
  5. talk turkey. An expression meaning “to speak frankly.” Has some debatable origins.
  6. jive turkey: one who acts as if they know what they are talking about, but really doesn’t.
  7. Wild Turkey. A brand of bourbon. My grandmother liked bourbon. Not sure if she had a preferred brand.
  8. cold turkey. The act of quitting abrubtly, without tapering off. As in “quit drinking cold turkey.” (Which may also involve quitting drinking Wild Turkey.)
  9. Turkey: a nation. (I wonder how often people not native to the US expect that there will be some sort of Turkish cultural event on Turkey day?)
  10. Twas the Night before Thanksgiving, by Dav Pilkey. A somewhat controversial picturebook about some kids who “liberate” some turkeys from a farm and have them over for dinner (but don’t have them for dinner). (I found the full text online listed as an “anonymously” written animal rights poem, but I think Pilkey was the orginal author.)

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¹ Some Americans will instead eat a tofurkey, such as a Tofurky, a tofu-based turkey substitute.

² Well, except maybe the bourbon, in some households.

Thanksgiving food for thought

We’re about to head out the door to go down to John’s parents’ for Thanksgiving. And of course, first and foremost on my mind is: “how will I get a post up tonight?” So I’m dashing off this bit of a placeholder.

And also taking the opportunity to share something new I learned about Thanksgiving from a video I saw this morning. Apparently, Thanksgiving was created as a national holiday in 1863. Sarah Hale, publisher and editor of a magazine, Gode’s Lady’s Book, was the motivating force behind getting Abraham Lincoln to declare the holiday, and to have it be during the workweek. She motivated women around the country to harrass their congressmen and senators to bring about the holiday. According to the folks interviewed in the video, the bits and pieces of myth and knowledge about the pilgrims were collected together and made part of the holiday, along with the recipes collected in the women’s magazine.

I just thought that was interesting. And not something that gets mentioned when we learn to draw hand-trace turkeys in elementary school.