Sunday, November 24, 2013

Pre-Thanksgiving Post

OK, I started listing to Christmas music even though Thanksgiving isn't here yet.  As soon as my ghosts and other Halloween decoration went down the afternoon of November 1, I  vowed, as I've done every year not to put up my Christmas decoration until after Thanksgiving.  I left the suction cups I used to display my Halloween lights on the kitchen window to use again for my Christmas lights.  But as far as the music goes, I just couldn't resist doing that after hearing Christmas music over the loud speakers at various neighborhood stores. And today I was playing with the Christmas music kiosk at Target  that plays samples from Christmas music CDs.  


And every year, there are always complaints about Thanksgiving being forgotten.  That stores always go from Halloween to Christmas, with Christmas getting into stores before Halloween is even over.
 I have said this in past years, but Thanksgiving just doesn't seem like a decoration-centric holiday.  The same people  who hung fake ghosts on their porch and placed jack-o-lanterns on the lawn at Halloween and who will be decorating their house with many strands of colored Christmas lights don't seem as likely to put  some sort of pilgrim or turkey decorations on the lawns and porches.  yet year after year, everyone complains about a lack of decorations for Thanksgiving.  For Thanksgiving, decorations, if there are any, seem limited to the table during the dinner.  Today at Kmart I saw a small cube display of Thanksgiving decor, limited to  paper plates, napkins and cups (seen in the photo) table cloths,  and some sparkly pumpkins.  Look carefully and you can see that one side actually contains Christmas decorations!

It doesn't seem that stores like Kmart and Target make much money off Thanksgiving. Rather, it's the grocery stores that seem to be making money off the holiday, since people are more likely to be getting their turkeys and stuffing at Safeway than at Target.  

Even though I don't do a lot for Thanksgiving, I don't dislike the holiday. Some might argue that it's just not a holiday that has a lot of fun or action.  We aren't staying up drinking and counting down to the upcoming year. We're not hunting for pastel eggs hidden in patches of grass at a baseball park.  We're not watching fireworks. We're not dressing as clowns and witches and knocking on doors for candy, or (for the adults) competing for best costume at a neighborhood bar.  We're not dragging a large piece of foliage into the corner of our living room  to be decorated with tinsel and glass balls.  I must admit I paraphrased some of these lines from this article.  I have to agree with these points.  Though I don't hate Thanksgiving,  I'm just one of those people who doesn't really get into it.   I'm not sure yet what I'll be doing this year.  In the last few years, my family and I have been going to see the "Twilght" movies.  The franchise of course, ended last year, and this year, the newest movie in the "Hunger Games" series has been released the Friday before Turkey Day.  We plan on seeing it this week, but it probably won't be on Thanksgiving.  We're actually looking at doing it tomorrow, but don't know for sure yet.   Will lt you know when this happens.

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