Things I didn't know, but probably should have...

[hells_half_acre]

Did you know that Americans celebrate Thanksgiving on a Thursday?! I didn't.

I can't believe that I've watched American movies and television, read American books and stories, and lived just north of America for my whole life and I never realized that Thanksgiving is on a Thursday for them.

What a strange day for a holiday.

I will file this under: Things Unexpectedly Learned from Watching Supernatural (in this case, specifically learned by time-lining it.)

I never understood why Americans bothered to travel home for Thankgiving - I mean, American Thanksgiving is so close to Christmas, it doesn't make much sense financially. But, I suppose if you are getting a 4/5 day weekend, you might as well go somewhere. Plus, Thanksgiving seems to be a much bigger deal in the US than it is in Canada.

Or maybe it was just never a big deal for my family. My Mum declared that we could only afford turkey once a year, so we choose Christmas. Sam and Dean had their Thanksgiving bucket of chicken, and we had our Thanksgiving chicken stir-fry.

So yeah, cultural differences I suppose...Canadian Thanksgiving is on a Monday, so you end your long weekend with a celebratory huge feast, instead of beginning it with one. Thursday indeed! SO STRANGE!

Comments

[jillsjourney.livejournal.com]

Hee hee. Yes, the thurs and fri are holidays, most people have the day off for both. unless you work in a store, in which case the day after is black friday, when people kill each other for a good sale on xmas gifts.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

I repeat: SO STRANGE!

Hahaa, I just can't believe I never noticed it was a Thursday before, especially since I'm used to the news reports from south of the border about how many people were trampled to death on Black Friday. :-P

[dairygirl.livejournal.com]

I guess I never thought it was weird to have Thanksgiving on a Thursday because that is the way it always was. Think of it as more time to recover from the turkey overdose, yeah?

And spending time with family is good, but I am only 1.5 hours from mine so easier to travel than for many.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Yeah, for you it'd be the opposite...if you woke up tomorrow and someone said "We're going to have Thanksgiving on a Monday now" you'd probably be like "What?!!?" and I'd be there thinking "what's the big deal?"

I just find it hard to imagine taking the time/money to travel home for the a long weekend at the end of November, and then turning around and doing it again two-three weeks later for Christmas...but yeah, if you are only 1.5 hours away, it's no big deal.

But yeah, mostly I'm just surprised that I never realized that Americans didn't have their Thanksgiving on a monday like we do... I mean, the early-October/late-November different is pretty easy to spot, but I never noticed the day difference before.

[claudiapriscus.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure why Lincoln decided a thursday was good, but I'm fine with it, because it means a four day weekend.


I love Thanksgiving. It is an awesome holiday. All the fun of friends and/or family, but without the baggage or stress of Christmas. Actually, Thanksgiving and the 4th of July are my favorite holidays, which make me sound like an uber-patriot, but really, it's just that they've not been totally commercialized and they're good fun.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

That's true. Thanksgiving is like the last family-gettogether holiday you guys have that has not been overly commercialized.

I don't like Halloween because I don't like dressing up and I don't like it when people come to the door, but other than that, I think I like every holiday just the same. I'm not religious, so I mainly just like them for the days off work. :-P

But yeah, Christmas can be way too stressful, especially since it's the one holiday where I AM expected to visit my family. New Years is pretty annoying too, because people make way too much of a deal.

[claudiapriscus.livejournal.com]

I like halloween fine as a children's holiday; the adult kind (at least that I see where i live) kind of creeps me out, and not in the intended way. It's so...depressing.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Yes, exactly...I mean, I can get over my hatred of strangers at the door if I know they are cute little kids and all I have to do is give them candy...

...but I really don't like adult costume parties. Which is apparently a problem when one lives in Vancouver, because "themed" parties are all the rage here all year 'round. Arg.

[claudiapriscus.livejournal.com]

I don't mind mild ones. My roommate threw one that was vaguely 'mad men' / 'early 60s' themed, and that just meant wearing kind of cool retro dresses and serving martinis and her usual midwestern appetizers, which were apparently all the rage back in the day.

I was pleased to have an excuse to wear a really cool looking dress that had been my grandmother's.

What gets me about the adult holloween parties here- especially the ones at the casinos/clubs- is that it's basically like - 'buy your costume at a sex shop' (though only for women). Men's costumes don't seem to matter at all, but some of my (girl) friends would get shit for not dressing like a porn star, and just get harassed all night about it- whereas the ones who were dressed like porn stars got harassed in other ways.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Ugh, yeah...the sexy___ costumes. For halloween this year, I had to use the clothes I already owned, so what i did was get dressed up really nice and went as a "high class prostitute" because that way I was "playing along" but didn't have be more revealing than I'm comfortable with...plus, it went well with the fact that my sister went in drag.

But yeah...the things we do to be social.

[auriliawestlake.livejournal.com]

Huh. Y'all have yours on Monday??? WTF, mate? How...weird.

Like you, I knew it was a difference of month, but Monday? Seriously???

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

lol! EXACTLY!

Man, traveling between Canada and the US is sort of like entering the Twilight Zone - sure it LOOKS similar, but the differences boggle the mind. ;-)

[duowolf.livejournal.com]

We don't even have one in the UK. *cries*

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

I guess your harvests just aren't worth celebrating. ;-)

We don't have Guy Fox day...does that make us even?

[duowolf.livejournal.com]

I guess blowing stuff up is a little more fun then eating. I know we used to do a harvest celebration back when I was in first school but it seems to have died out. Maybe because most people over here have nothing to do with farms at all.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

that's the spirit! Blowing stuff up is much more fun than eating - and better for staying slim too (especially if you have to run away from explosions)

(If we ignore this year), you also have much less harsh winters than most of North America - so, probably the idea of the final harvest before the snow falls isn't that big of a deal. I'm speaking for Canada here, of course, (because I know half the states is nice year-round), but man, even though we have super markets and international food imports, part of me would always get instinctually nervous after the first major snowfall every year and I'd have this crazy desire to start hoarding canned goods. :-P

[duowolf.livejournal.com]

People do that here as well at christmas time it's like they go crazy. The supermarkets are only shut for a day at the most but they go crazy buying everything they can get their hands on. It's a little scary really.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Are the supermarkets open Sunday there? When I lived in Germany, we always had to remember to stock up on Saturday :-P

I think the only place where it's been understandable was when I lived in Newfoundland. There, when it snows, it a three-day blizzard...so you really CAN'T go anywhere easily.

[duowolf.livejournal.com]

Most big shops open Sundays here and all supermarkets open on Sundays though it's usually on reduced hours. The one I work at is only open 6 hrs on a Sunday but 24hrs every other day of the week. Garages open everydays as well and the one my husband works at is a 24hrs one that is even open on christmas Day.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Ah cool...same as here, then.

[trystan830.livejournal.com]

heh, i knew that. oh wait, i'm American. ;)

it's a day for family, food and football - no idea why it's on a thursday. never questioned it, i guess.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

We don't have the football...other than that, it's basically the same.

So, I guess I never questioned why Monday! But as far as days go, Thursday's not bad.

[trystan830.livejournal.com]

heh, cool.

thursday's pretty good - short work-week, and 4-day weekend. ;)

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Yeah, ours is sort of an unofficial four-day weekend. In that people usually ditch work on Friday too. In comparison to other countries, Canadians don't get that many official days off work - we also statistically take less sick-days. Apparently we are a nation of people who work way too hard. :-P

[trystan830.livejournal.com]

LOL... but aww... *pets*

[contrary-lady.livejournal.com]

LOL, I'm so used to celebrating Thanksgiving on a Thursday, that I thought it was weird when I found out Canadian Thanksgiving is on a Monday! :p

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Haha...well, it's nice to know the twilight-zone feeling runs both ways :-P