Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving Sandy whipped up a feast, sans turkey of course, us being the "vegetarian-except-seafood-what-the-hell-does-that-mean?" people that we are. Mashed potatoes, rolls and butter, stuffing, gravy, corn, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, pumpkin pie... the works...

It was a starchy extravaganza!


It was of course followed up with the obligatory post-large meal nap, in the traditions of the founding fathers...



I really wanted to go whole hog and have a "real" Thanksgiving by breaking into the neighbors house, slaughtering them and then claiming I "discovered" a new land... or at least leaving some smallpox infected blankets on their porch... but Sandy just wanted to do the food thing.

Besides, the Japanese probably wouldn't have really appreciated such fine American customs.

Oh well, maybe next year.

'Why I Hate Thanksgiving'
By Mitchel Cohen

The year was 1492. The Taino-Arawak people of the Bahamas discovered Christopher Columbus on their beach.

Historian Howard Zinn tells us how Arawak men and women, naked, tawny, and full of wonder, emerged from their villages onto the island's beaches and swam out to get a closer look at the strange big boat. When Columbus and his sailors came ashore, carrying swords, speaking oddly, the Arawaks ran to greet them, brought them food, water, gifts. Columbus later wrote of this in his log. Here is what he wrote:

"They brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which they exchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells. They willingly traded everything they owned. They were well-built, with good bodies and handsome features. They do not bear arms, and do not know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out of ignorance. They have no iron. Their spears are made of sugar cane. They would make fine servants. With 50 men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want."

And so the conquest began...