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Happy Thanksgiving

Posted by Carole Stuart on November 25, 2009 | Permalink

I wanted to put something up on Hot News for Thanksgiving. But being basically lazy, today’s blog is from my friend, and funny man, Lew Grossberger, who eloquently said, “Sure” when I asked if I could put his latest column up on our Web site.  You should check Lew out—you’ll find him on trueslant.com/lewgrossberger on a regular basis.  I’m sure you’ll enjoy this and his other blogs.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Carole

THE FIRST THANKSGIVING...WHAT REALLY HAPPENED.

Every year at this time, as my loved ones sink into a stupor often followed by coma, I read the true story of the first Thanksgiving. No matter how rough the weather or how dry the turkey, this recitation of the beloved holiday classic never fails to make listeners and readers shed a tear as they come to appreciate the rich bounty that is Oprah Winfrey’s and Goldman Sachs’s but not theirs.

It was the year 1620 when the strange people known as The Pilgrims set sail from England, crashed into Plymouth Rock and set about the daunting task of learning to spell Massachusetts.

Their ship, the Mayflower, had sprung a leak at one point but was saved by a massive bailout.

The Pilgrims were humble, God-fearing folk who sought only the freedom to oppress others as they had been oppressed back home. Thus they were overjoyed to encounter the Indians.

The first reaction of the Indians (who were really the Native Americans but refused to admit it for several hundred years) has not been recorded but according to witnesses, one is said to have ruminated, “They come here, they walk around like they own the place, they wear stupid-looking hats… Who are these assholes?”

Food was scarce and the winter cruel, or perhaps vice versa, but The Plucky Pilgrims survived because thanks to the teachings of their religion, Pillism, they genuinely enjoyed misery. Adapting to local customs, they learned to stay indoors during blizzards, catch some of the exciting new fatal diseases available on this continent and wear the skins of animals, first taking care to remove the original owner.

Even dying Pilgrims felt better off in the New World, since everything here was newer and shinier than in the Old World. Besides, Europe was a breeding ground for socialism, as their town crier, Glemuel Beck, kept reminding them between bursts of sobbing. Plus the New World nightlife was livelier, consisting as it did of witches cavorting orgiastically with Satan in the woods.

The Pilgrims were not the first English colonists here; that honor went to Jamestown in Virginia. Few people today are aware of it because A) The Pilgrims hired a great public-relations man and B) there’s something off-putting about a town where everyone is named James. But most of all, because of C) the Jamestown colonists’ failure to invent Thanksgiving. Their excuse, that they had no food, was pathetic.

The Pilgrims didn’t have much either but they did boast resourceful leaders. While his constituents debated whether to deep fry or roast heretics, Governor William Hussein Bradford swallowed his pride (though it contained little nutritional value) and went to see Massasoit, the great sachem of the Wampanoags to beg for foreign aid.

Massasoit turned him down flat. Desperate, Bradford went to Wampanoag, the great massasoit of the Sachems. There he got lucky. W, as he was known, went on CNN—the Corn Niblet Network—and ordered his braves as well as his cowards to teach The Pilgrims the ancient lore of the woods. The Indians imparted such essential survival tricks as planting seeds in order to grow crops and after the crops fail, buying produce wholesale.

Having toiled in the fields for a full hour, The Pilgrims needed a break and declared a three-day feast of Giving Thank Yous (changed in 1938 to Thanksgiving). The Indians were invited in the hope they would bring a decent dessert but their skunk-cabbage strudel didn’t go over that well.

Following the feast came the entertainment, which was a rousing success until the Pilgrim comic Jamie Leno was stoned to death for letting his act go on too long.

It all went down in history as The First Thanksgiving, the beginning of a glorious tradition of humble and solemn overeating of bland foods and expressing gratitude to our creator for not killing us until a later date as yet unknown to us and allowing us in the meantime to watch a football game.

 

 

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