Hefner Trumps Baskin Robbins

Posted by John

I certainly wasn’t exaggerating about my love for Halloween just as I can assure you my good friend Chris was not exaggerating about his love for Thanksgiving. He also wasn’t exaggerating that I dressed up as him one year for Halloween. Here’s the picture to prove it:

Admittedly I didn’t develop my Halloween costume criteria until several years after this costume because this one was neither badass nor did the mustache make it even marginally more badass. In fact, it just made it a bit more pedophilish. In no way am I suggesting that my friend Chris was not badass in 1997; nor am I suggesting he was a pedophile, to my knowledge; I’m simply saying in 1997 his look was more douche-ass than badass. I mean, he actually came to college sporting a my-first-mustache. It’s amazing that strange freshman girls with low self-esteem and questionable morals would make out with him before he blacked out with something like that crawling around on his upper lip.

Suffice it to say, he’s come a long way from those days. Gone is the mustache and now he has a new Indians hat and Tommy Hilfiger shirt to wear.

I must say though, he did exaggerate one thing in his recent post – there was at least one year of his life when Halloween was like rocky road ice cream to him. Back in 2001 when we were living together with 4 other dudes in the most badass apartment Ada, Ohio had to offer, we hosted a killer Halloween party where we all dressed up as different characters from the Simpsons cartoon. Granted, in addition to making my own Sideshow Bob costume I had to make Chris’ Jimbo Jones outfit, but still, we all had a great time with it, including Chris, and not least of all because he made out with some strange girl and blacked out at the end of the night.

From the left: Duffman, Krusty the Clown, Sideshow Bob (apparently before I started working out 2 hours a day, 8 days a week), Jimbo Jones, Selma Bouvier, Snowball, Sideshow Mel, Marge, Bumblebee Man.

As far back as our friendship goes and as many things as we do agree on, one thing Chris and I will always have to agree to disagree on is our love for holidays.

I have no love for Thanksgiving nor do I think I ever will.

Here’s my main beef with Thanksgiving – the meal. Why is it that all across America on this one day every year, every family is eating some form of turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn, cranberries, etc., etc.? We don’t eat that combination of food on any other day of the year; why Thanksgiving? In fact, let me take it one step further – I love turkey sandwiches, turkey burgers, turkey sausage, you name it. But have you ever been in any restaurant of any merit that isn’t a Golden Corral, Ryan’s Steakhouse, or Hometown Buffet and seen turkey on the menu? Seriously, when was the last time you were at any restaurant – not even a restaurant with a chef, just a restaurant with cooks – where you saw turkey on the menu? Why do you think that is? Is it that Thanksgiving has such a corner on the turkey market that we can’t eat it any other time of year? Or is it that unless you process turkey into near oblivion and slap it on a 6” cold cut trio Subway Sub that it becomes edible? Have you ever had Thanksgiving turkey that wasn’t dry, flakey, flavorless and disgusting? You haven’t.

The only reason you think turkey is good is because of the gravy. In fact, that’s why gravy was invented – to cover up the taste of something that is so godawful you wouldn’t normally eat it. You literally have to drown turkey meat in liquefied fat, cholesterol-infused, calorie-laden gravy to make it edible. Name one decent food that you would actually put gravy on to make it better. Cereal? Disgusting. Pizza? Not in a million years. McDonald’s french fries? I almost just threw up.

Let me put it in very simple terms for you: gravy is the porno magazine of the food pyramid. That is to say, gravy is like a porno magazine because everyone likes it, it makes something that is otherwise horrible more palatable, but if you really step back and look at it with some perspective, it’s really kind of gross and despicable. For instance:

“What do you mean we have to go to your sister’s graduation this weekend? Didn’t she just graduate from something like two years ago? How many goddamn graduations can one person have? Fine, whatever. The only way I’m making it through this is to bring a porno magazine.” And somehow that porno makes an otherwise horrible situation bearable.  

Or, “Goddamnit! My flight is delayed for 6 hours!? This is the worst day ever! What on earth am I going to do for 6 hours? Unless… Yup, here it is – my porno magazine,” and suddenly 6 hours feels like 20 minutes.

It’s like if someone were to approach you and say, “We’re going to play a little game here in which I slap you in the face repeatedly with a cactus while you are powerless to defend yourself. The only thing you’ll have at your disposal is this box of porno magazines.”

“What? Why on earth would I allow you to slap me in the face with a cact… Wait - did you say there was a box of porno involved? Cool; I fucking love porno. Sign me up.”

Under normal circumstances no human being would allow themselves to get slapped in the face with a cactus just like they wouldn’t eat dry, flavorless turkey breast. But you throw in some porno or gravy and suddenly you’re getting excited. Like really excited. It just doesn’t make sense. And just like you wouldn’t whip out some porno in the middle of a normal, enjoyable situation like game night with your friends or something, you also wouldn’t put gravy on a normal, edible meal. Neither is socially acceptable and both are, quite frankly, a little gross. These are just facts.

I don’t know when my disdain for Thanksgiving started but I know it was at a very young age. Years later someone suggested maybe I didn’t like it because my mother was a bad cook. Holy shit I almost shanked that sawed-off sonofabitch in the face. I don’t care if my mom is the goddamn witch in Hansel and Gretel, boiling up kidnapped children to serve to us every night, you don’t, for one second, think that you can suggest to my face that she was a poor cook and not come away with an old toothbrush that I meticulously whittled down to a deadly point sticking out of your fucking cheek.

Whenever, and for whatever reason my dislike for Thanksgiving started, it hasn’t waned over the years. I just don’t understand the obsession with gorging yourself on mediocre food at best. I for one am not willing to voluntarily eat so much food that I find myself in a situation where I can do nothing but lay around on the couch and watch tv while simultaneously feeling like I’m going to puke and shit my pants. Every other day of the year there is a name for that – it’s called the flu, and you already know about my recent run-in with the flu.

If I could summarize this whole discussion by comparing various holidays to porno magazines, it would look something like this:

Halloween: Playboy (classy, fun, and timeless)

Christmas: Penthouse (exciting in that you never really know what you’re going to get)

Memorial Day: Hustler (not really my cup of tea, but in the absence of any other holiday, I’ll take it)

Valentine’s Day: FHM (lame)

Thanksgiving: Barely Legal (no class and I always come away feeling kind of sick)

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some literature I need to organize to help me get through the upcoming holiday. 




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