Thanksgiving was so long ago by now that people have probably forgotten it happened, but this story bears telling, I think.  Better late than never and all that.

I love Thanksgiving- a holiday devoted to eating, and no gift stress! Seventeen kinds of carbs! A socially acceptable time to eat Cool Whip and jellied cranberry sauce shaped like a can!

But in recent years, it’s gotten a little stressful in my house. My wonderful mother, who usually hosts and cooks, wants so badly for everyone to be happy, wants everything to be perfect, that she gets anxious, and stressed, and doesn’t seem to enjoy herself, and we in turn don’t enjoy OURSELVES, such is our stress at observing her stress, and…well, ours can’t be the only family like this, right?

Anyway, so this year, I had a few days off around Thanksgiving, because I changed jobs. (Yes, again. Changing jobs is, apparently, my job. This one is for good! Or at least for longer than  a year! Swearsies!)  With that extra time, I volunteered to cook the entire meal. I like cooking, it doesn’t stress me out, I figured it’d be good for everyone.  We’d eat on time! There would be no tears! We would finally have enough stuffing!

Foolish, foolish me.

It almost came off without a hitch, until the cranberry sauce gave my mother a black eye. Yes, really. Something about the fridge door hitting her elbow and bonking the dish into her eye on its way to the floor? I’m still a little unclear on details.

Yeah, we didn’t eat on time.

Still, all was not lost. This Thanksgiving will live forever in our memories as the year that my family embraced Flo Rida.

You know, Flo Rida? Or, as I call him, Flo, for short? The rapper?

This guy:

It was all my grandmother’s fault, obviously.

My grandmother came for Thanksgiving from California. She’s 93, and doesn’t get around too much, so her shopping options are limited. However, she loves Poppy more than anything on earth, I think, and would not stand for coming to Thanksgiving without a gift. So she hired a taxi to drive her to the Hallmark store to buy something. There, she found a little reindeer that sang and danced, and thought Poppy would get a kick out of it.

She didn’t look too closely, and didn’t recognize the song, but no big! It was catchy!

Damn if she wasn’t right.

Yes, inexplicably the dancing reindeer rocks out to the musical stylings of Flo, and my kid’s favorite song is now “club can’t handle me.” And my dad knows the words. My mom, too. Thanksgiving win.