TF Views

Ate a lot with family and friends and it was a good weekend all around.

Incidently, Thanksgiving is actually celebrated in more countries than just the US. Early reports indicate that it actually started as a way for christians to celebrate Christmas in the winter time during the reign of the Puritans when things like that weren't allowed.

Which is partially why I usually refer to Thanksgiving as Christmas Part 1: The Fattening! Coming soon: Christmas Part II: Electric Boogaloo.

Thanksgiving in America started in the early 1600s, and wasn't in November. We celebrate the Plymouth harvest thanksgiving mainly because Lincoln during the war needed the country to rally around something. And lest you think the Black Friday selling is a cheapening of the holiday, it was FDR during the Great Depression who changed it to the next-to-last Thursday of November so that retailers could take advantage of an extra week of holiday shopping (that year, November had 5 Thursdays).

I'd read about that and I find it interesting to find out where all the holidays actually originate from. I've recently been named a writer for our division newsletter here at work and one of the articles I write is called "That Time of Year" where I list the various holidays for the quarter, their origin, traditions, etc. It's really quite interesting and seldom is it really about what we think it's about.