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Thanksgiving is generally remembered as a time for family reunions, gratitude, and, of course, delicious food. But for some people, it’s a holiday associated with a particular incident that will forever be etched in their memories.
These folks shared their stories on Reddit for the entire internet to see. Some are about pranks that made for a fun evening, while others were recollections of typical drama around this time of year.
Many of you likely have Thanksgiving anecdotes of your own. After scrolling through, feel free to share them in the comments.
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#1
I was having a farting contest with my cousin in the bathroom. She let out one of those ones that ends in an upturned squeak, like her a*****e was meekly asking me a question. I lost it and threw my head back in laughter, and when my head came back down, it was into the granite countertop. at like 127 mph. I split my forehead open and had to go to the ER for stitches.But wait^theresmore.
In the ER, one of the nurses asked how I cut my forehead and I told her I was laughing at a fart. She laugh-farted in response.
I was 11 so obviously it was the funniest goddamn thing that had ever happened to me.
Anyway I’m 30 now and still have that stupid scar right between my eyebrows and sometimes I remember how I ruined thanksgiving like 20 years ago and then a nurse farted and I laugh.
#2
A family friend, who happened to be lesbian, thought it would be a good idea to carry at least 20 plates across the living room. As one could expect, she dropped all of the plates onto the floor.
Then my grandfather, who barely knows this friend says the most infamous words in our families history, “you know those lesbians. Slippery fingers.”.
#3
My mother and grandmother had plans to go to a restaurant last year, my sister convinces them to go somewhere else at last minute. Of course this means no reservations but sister is convinced that it'll be fine and they might just have to wait a few minutes for a table. I live in another state so I get to experience all of this from a distance.
They end up sitting at the bar while waiting for a table, having a few drinks and appetizers. After the 2nd round of martinis my mother looks over and my grandmother is leaning back in her chair, completely limp and unresponsive. Everyone freaks out, paramedics are called, grandma is rushed to the ER.
I'm 1,200 miles away when my mother calls to tell me what happened. At this point grandma is at the ER, still unresponsive, crazy low blood pressure and high heart rate. I'm ready to book plane tickets and rush to the airport when mom calls back "Don't worry, everything's OK, your grandmother just got drunk." Her blood test came back completely normal except with a BAC of 0.24 (3x legal limit). She was awake now so I got to talk to her and she was crying "I'm so sorry, I've ruined Thanksgiving." I assured her that she hasn't ruined Thanksgiving, and that everyone is just happy she's OK.
So my grandma is 90 years old, about 4'8", 100lbs. She hadn't eaten anything all day because she knew they were having a big dinner. She also ordered another martini while no one was looking, so the 2nd martini was actually her 3rd. This turned into the perfect storm of really drunk grandma.
TL;DR Grandma got run over by a martini.
#4
So 25 years ago my son was born early Nov. My mom's family is all prim and proper. So my adopted brother takes my 2 week old son to check his diaper during dinner. Comes back with diaper in hand saying it doesn't look right proceed to smell it said something is wrong. So he tasted it. Everyone is flipping out. He filled a clean diaper with pumpkin pie filling it was hilarious.
Yellow dot 1 week ago (edited)
Ha! My stepdad did something similar. My cat had a bad habit of taking dumps on my brothers possessions (jackets, DVD cases, etc). One day my stepdad came home from work at Franz bakery where he had taking some dough and shaped it like a coiled cat turd and he burnt it perfectly. He placed it in my brothers motorcycle helmet along with a camera behind the fridge to capture the moment. He went out with my brother to "do some work in the garage" while my bro got ready to leave. Bro notices the turd in his helmet and is all upset! Stepdad comes over, takes a look and grabs the burnt bread turd and took a big bite. Now, the cameras quality was a 90's camcorder, real bad. You could still see how large my bro's eyes got from across the room on that film. Ohhhhh, what a memory.. Oh! And my brother also took a step back in shock, just the whole thing was hilarious to 9yr old me. I wonder where that film is.
#5
I was a young adult. Mid 20s, good job turning into a career, bought a nice NYC apartment; growing up. We'd always had dinner with my mom's little sister. My aunt. We're all there chatting & eating appetizers. My brother is running late but he's *always* late. He lives up in Scarsdale & has more traffic to deal with. It's all normal chit chat until I catch my uncle making a nasty crack about my brother's tardiness to my mother which upsets her. She's easily upset & the uncle knows this. It was a pointless, nasty crack. It served only to upset my mother. **Suddenly, like Proust's Madeleine's, memories of him doing this to my mother for my entire life came flooding back.** I was immediately upset. I waited until he was alone in the kitchen and I casually but quite *seriously* squared up to him. I told that him if he *ever* spoke to my mother like that again and embarrassed her in front of her family that I'd be dead f*****g sure to embarrass him in front of *his* family. If that meant breaking my size 12 foot off in his a*s, I'd be more than happy to oblige him. Moreover, that I wasn't a little kid any more and his days of bullying my mother because nobody was backing her up were f*****g *over.* Then I smiled, patted him on the shoulder and went back out to the appetizers.
He was real, *real* quiet during dinner. Didn't really look up from his plate. We stopped having Thanksgiving together soon after.
#6
When I was a little kid, I asked to say the prayer. It was a big honor to get to say it. My family was notorious for fighting so I said my little prayer all nice and cute then ended with a smarta*s "God please let my family act normal today and not fight". Before I could blink my German grandmother slapped me across the face really hard which pissed my mother off. Lots of yelling and we left.
#7
My grandmother asks my atheist uncle to say grace. Normally he complies as he knows it's just a thing his mom likes her kids to do. But other conservative uncle has been proselytising to him all day and telling him he's worried he's going to hell and taking his non-church going kid with him. So instead of saying grace, he starts with, "Dear heavenly Father, please tell (conservative uncle) to take Jesus, Christmas, Easter, and a cross and shove it up his a*s." Finishes with an amen. Fisticuffs ensue.
#8
I was probably six or seven at the time. My mom’s candles caught the kitchen curtains and some decorative greenery on fire. My sister and my cousins and I were at the “kid’s table” in the kitchen while the adults were in the dining room, so no one of significance noticed anything except me. My mom threatened us with pain of death if we annoyed the adults during dinner, so I quietly walked to the dining room and stood silently for a minute or two, until someone noticed me, and only then did I politely say, “Sorry, but the kitchen’s on fire.” My mom still gives me grief about my prioritizing politeness over common sense....
#9
This Thanksgiving would be special, we invited somewhere around 25 people (normally it would've been 12) and everyone arrived. Naturally, my mother bought a seriously large turkey, and had it slow cooking all day. It was going to be the highlight of the day and everyone was looking forward to it.
Fast forward, the turkey is out of the oven and is being carved. It looks and smells delicious, the table is set.
Everyone's sitting down at the table, passing around mashed potatoes and talking about whatever. My mom is bringing the turkey from the kitchen into the dining room.
She drops the turkey platter. It shatters, turkey and porcelain shards litter the floor.
Thankfully, most of the turkey was salvaged due to the 5 second rule. Some of us had shards of turkey platter on our plates but it wasnt a big deal.
The turkey WAS as good as it promised to be, and it is sometimes mentioned as the legendary floor bird.
Dragons Exist 1 week ago
I mean, as long as you threw away the parts that were on the floor & had shards then the turkey's fine
#10
Incident? I hadn’t seen my parents in two years because I lived really far away. They have dinner at my oldest friend’s family’s house every year. Without anyone except my friend knowing, I flew to where he lives and we drove together to his parents house in time for dinner. We drove up to the house and I saw my unsuspecting parents in the window, drinking wine and having a few appetizers with my friend’s unsuspecting parents.
I’m smaller than my friend so I hid behind him when we walked in the door. He went in and was greeted by excited hellos, then I walked out from behind and everyone froze in surprise! I felt very loved.
Edit: It was a good freeze, even with some tears!
KatSaidWhat 1 week ago
Did this for my father's wedding/70th (within 2 days of each other) - flew into Joburg from London, phoned him the night before we flew to Durban via Whatsapp, wished him luck. Went down with my brothers who were driving. Father comes to open electronic gate, face down in phone until I'm right in front of him. Shook! "But you're in London - you phoned me from London" Lol. Turns out my stepbrother also did same from Italy. - my father opened his wedding speech with "this marriage has started on lies" because my [now] stepmother had been part of the planning 😆😆😆
#11
My dad had an allergic reaction to shrimp cocktail before dinner and his face blew up. He refused to come out of the kitchen or sit at the table with us. He was just eating his food in the kitchen and trying to act like things were normal, like yelling out “Hey, good mashed potatoes this year, huh?”
Meanwhile, my mom is anger-crying at the table, telling us to just eat our f*****g food that she worked all day on. All of us kids are just very scared and very confused. My sister starts crying because things are so weird and no one wants to eat because there is so much tension. Eventually, my mom convinces my dad that she needs to take him to the ER. My high school senior-aged brother took the bottle of wine and shared it with seventh grade me and got me drunk for the first time. My parents came home to me throwing up on the bathroom floor.
#12
My 4-year old sister was sitting at the dinner table next to Grandma. After taking a bite of something she said "my tongue hurts" to which Grandma replied , "well come here and let me kiss it to make it feel better." The moment their lips touched, my sister vomited directly into Grandma's mouth. My dad bursts into laughter and Grandma passes off my sister while she gets up to go clean up in the bathroom. Not more than 5 seconds after she left, a 2 square foot chunk of the ceiling caved in and fell directly onto her chair.
TLDR: my sister puked into my grandmother's mouth to save her life while eating Thanksgiving dinner.
#13
My great grandmother died at the table right as we were bowing our heads to pray on Thanksgiving. She had been slowly dwindling in health so the whole family gathered together figuring it was her last Thanksgiving, little did we know how right we were. Her kids, their kids and their kids kids, family she hasn't seen in years, about 20 people all gathered around with her pushed up in her recliner. Food is stuffed on the table and we bow our heads to pray (she was devoutly religious) before we dig in. As we raise our heads and open our eyes we find great grandma slumped over, tongue lolling out dead. As someone started compressions and another person called an ambulance, my youngest cousin dug into her meal completely unaffected by the dead body. Anyway, a nice memory for Thanksgiving every year.
#14
I thought it would be a funny prank to put a rubber chicken in the oven on Thanksgiving. My mom would laugh and laugh. Ho ho ho, there's a rubber chicken in the oven, what a gag.
13 year old me didn't realize that normal adults usually preheat the oven before putting the turkey in.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
This reminds me of my mother - not because of the chicken, but - she likes to dry things in her oven, such as dish towels, lids to plastic storage containers, etc. She doesn't turn the oven ON to dry them, just lays them on the rack like it's a drying rack and shuts the oven door. Of course, by the next day, she's entirely forgotten they're in there, so when she preheats the oven to make something... yeeeah. I've put out many an oven dishtowel-fire and scraped many a melted Tupperware lid off of the racks XD
#15
My aunt not being able to come because she was in jail for trying to shoplift a turkey from the grocery.
#16
One Thanksgiving my older brother took over cooking duties. He had just graduated from culinary school and was an amazing chef. My aunt and cousins came over to find a juicy Turkey and amazing sides. She likes her turkey burned apparently and made her family not eat the dinner. They all watched us eat. My mom was so pissed they never got invited back to our house for any event for years.
#17
I heard some screaming from outside my apartment. I opened the door and saw this lady running to the dumpster with a turkey still in the pan on fire. She threw it into the dumpster which then caught fire. I called 911 so the fire department could put it out.
#18
Last year my parents were discussing my younger brother, who's in college and wanted to take a gap semester. They were concerned because he already wasn't showing much focus and they were worried that if he took a gap semester then he would never go back.
I tried to reassure them by reminding them that I, like him, really hated college the first time I went, but then I went back a second time and had more drive and focus because the second attempt was based on my own desire to improve myself, rather than just trying to please them.
And my dad very calmly and casually said, "Yea, well, you're not exactly the role model we want him to emulate."
And that was pretty much the most savage thing my dad ever said to me. Thankfully I had already known for quite some time that I was the black sheep of the family, but to hear him say it so bluntly was unexpected, and I basically stormed out without another word.
#19
Not really a negative incident but we left my one aunt in charge of cooking the turkey.
Fast forward a couple of hours and we're all playing cards when someone mentions "wait, why don't we smell the turkey?" Yep, she completely forgot to turn on the oven and let it sit there for about five hours with no heat.
We had pizza that year.
Janissary35680 1 week ago
My favorite Thanksgiving menu is a large pizza with everything and a bottle of Wild Turkey.
#20
It's not like a crazy story but my uncle was dating this lady who was super fake and acted like she was faaaamly from the beginning. She kept asking to host a holiday and my mom wanting to be nice said she could have Thanksgiving because that was my mom's holiday to host and she wanted the gf to feel included.
We all go there and the house is filthy. I'm talking big clumps of old dust bunnies right out in the open all over the place, living room, kitchen, hallways, just everywhere. Smells like a garbage can. I have to use the toilet and I go upstairs to where she says it is. Laundry everywhere. But I get to the bathroom and its caked with mold and a mountain of garbage, makeup supplies and just c**p piled on one of the two sinks in there. Toilet was white with black gunk caked into the sides. I held my pee.
She also ordered in food and served it to us on styrofoam plates. Not that I need it on nice plates but lady you BEGGED for a holiday and then didn't do any hosting at all.
We never went to her place again.
#21
Last Thanksgiving was absolutely the worst. My extended family live in another state, so it was just me and my parents. My mom was pissed at my stepdad for various reasons, so she stayed in her room all day. My stepdad and I awkwardly ate in silence while watching the Godfather. Then after dinner he had a heart attack. He died in the hospital a few days later. My mom was crushed that he was gone, and crushed at how she treated him in their last few days together. That was last year. I'm not excited to see what this year brings.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
This is from a Reddit thread that is 6 years old... I hope OP's mom has forgiven herself for how she acted and has found some peace :( (and OP too!)
#22
Ah, the worst one was probably where the entire family (an odd 20 or so) got sick so we all had to take turns going into the bathroom to throw up for the rest of the night. Nobody ate the Turkey after that.
#23
I was only a toddler at the time but thanksgiving is known as the anniversary of the day my mother, father, and uncle outed one another as [illegal substance] addicts! life fell apart fairly rapidly the following year and it has been fun ever since. thanksgiving is now just a small family affair of myself, my brother, and my guardian grandparents
edit: thanks for the concern! my brother and i are doing well, i’m 23 now and this was about 20 years ago. so far as i know, it was EXACTLY like a mexican standoff lmao
for my parents and uncle, they have been in and out of jail, rehab, and everything in between. my mom certainly struggles more than my dad does bc she’s bipolar and has always been more than a little selfish and narcissistic, d***s just made it a hell of a lot worse. but my grandparents are my parents now and they’re wonderful, strong, and inspiring people, so i’m not particularly bothered! happy thanksgiving, always moving onward.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
Actual photo of OP's mother, father, and uncle at the moment that OP is speaking of XD (joking aside, I am very happy that OP and their brother were raised well by their grandparents and it sounds like it was a happy upbringing! The Three-Way Substance Standoff was apparently a good thing for OP and brother) Spiderman-...667856.jpg 
#24
My grandpa and grandma got divorced, and grandpa remarried.
One Thanksgiving, my not-so-well grandpa stood and declared he regretted letting my grandma divorce him, and that it was the biggest mistake of his life. Right in front of his current wife.
edit: holy s**t sorry I didn't realize people would give a f**k. What happened next? What did this outburst of drama culminate to? Nothing. He sat back down, old wife chuckled nervously, we continued with speeches (yes this was during the "what are you thankful for" round about) and all tried to act like it didn't happen. Everyone was thanking the current wife for taking care of him and everything she does, lots of love, but she was visibly upset/disappointed. Now (many years later) he's in a nursing home and she's not.
#25
I'm leaving for basic training the day before Thanksgiving this year. So, my family celebrated on Sunday. My mom and step-dad were supposed to stop by (they live an hour South, and have a cabin an hour north) on their way home. Well, 6pm rolls around and they still haven't shown.
Turns out, my SD decided that he didn't want to go to my uncles and instead wanted to meet us at my grandparents. Which he never told us. So he just drove right on home, denying my mother her last chance to see me before I'm gone until February. I'm honestly still pretty angry.
Beth Wheeler 1 week ago
Who is more pissed off the soldier or the mother? Either way that jerk is sleeping in the doghouse for a long time!
#26
My grandma accidentally poured dish soap on the turkey instead of oil... might have been one of the funniest but most upsetting things I’ve ever seen.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
Because I was curious if Grandma realized this BEFORE or AFTER cooking, from OP on Reddit: "[She realized] while she was in the middle of cooking it. She had put it back in the oven and when she took it out to baste again, there were bubbles coming out of the meat all over." -- alas! If it had been noticed before baking, IMO it maybe could have been carefully rinsed off :(
#27
Walked into the garage with my dog and a casserole. My dads champion show dog came galloping out to meet me let out a death scream, had a heart attack and died. Tried cpr for ten minutes. It was clearly dead. He went inside saying what did (me)he do! Grabbed a bottle and left. I picked up the dog and went around to vet clinics for one that was open, the one that was just said yes he’s dead.
I’ve never recovered. It was also my birthday.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
I'm not really sure who walked inside (the dad?) and... grabbed a bottle and left? A bottle of what? Alcohol? O_O; Either way, this absolutely sucks and NO ONE should have blamed OP for the dog's death :(
#28
My oldest sister called another sister "a fat b***h" over some stupid fight they’ve been having for years, who then in turn picked up the bowl of green bean casserole and threw it at her. She missed (it wasn’t that far, but I guess she was really angry and that messed up her aim), and it ended up hitting my mother's favorite painting. It wasn’t salvageable.
We all stopped having Thanksgiving with the entire family after that.
#29
My family had a Thai exchange student during Thanksgiving one year. Thanksgiving is *huge* in our family--35+ people at dinner, tons of food, appetizers out the wazoo, etc--and this was going to be her first and only Thanksgiving, so we really played up how exciting it was. We told her that there was going to be a ton of food, so don't eat a big breakfast! Save room for the amazing Thanksgiving food!
She ended up not eating anything at all on Wednesday or Thursday morning and fainted in my uncle's living room on Thanksgiving day. She hadn't even eaten any appetizers--turned out that she didn't know what that word meant, and didn't know she was allowed to eat the food that was spread out all over the coffee table and bar.
We almost had to take her to the emergency room because her English wasn't quite good enough to explain why she fainted and we thought something was seriously wrong. After all that, she ended up not even liking the food.
#30
My brother (10) decides to demonstrate how to properly body slam himself onto a bed to the cousins. Proceeds to hit his head on the windowsill behind the bed and crack his head open. We could see skull. Cousin passes out and the parents only console the kid who passes out. 15 stitches later, we got to eat dinner.
What do you think ?
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
Most "memorable" (not in a good way) was probably 2000, when I was 18. I had just gotten dumped by my first boyfriend and I was inconsolable and depressed, so after lunch I went to hang out with my friends (my family eats Thanksgiving lunch instead of dinner.) Apparently after I left, my dad decided to go up a ladder to help the people we hired to put up Christmas lights. He was in flip-flops and had had a few beers. He fell off of the ladder and sustained a catastrophic brain injury. My mom called me screaming and I arrived home to the firefighters washing blood off of our driveway. My dad was in a coma for 6 months and then emerged fully disabled - bedridden, needed diapers, needed a feeding tube installed, everything. We took care of him at home and I was his primary caregiver for 21 years, until he died in 2021. I just hope he was brain-damaged just enough so that he wasn't aware of how awful his situation was :( My immediate family doesn't really celebrate Thanksgiving any more :x
Sea Squirrel 1 week ago
This is by far the most memorable story overhere. I think everyone who reads it, will remember it. So sad this happened to your family - hug from Holland -
Load More Replies... Damned_Cat 1 week ago
My mother cooked every Thanksgiving meal for 20 years and always the exact same dishes every year, including a three-bean salad. When I got older, I decided to take over the cooking duties one year and make my meal unique with everything made from scratch. When I told mom that I didn't make any bean salad, she just lost it. "What do you mean there's No BeAn SaLad!!!?" We all sit down to eat and the first thing she points out to everyone is that I didn't make bean salad. No one cared and were content with the meal I made. Just as we are serving ourselves, my mother gets up, gets in her car, and drives off. A half-hour later she comes back with all of the ingredients for, of course, the bean salad which she quickly throws together in a bowl and sets it on the table. Usually this salad needs a few hours to chill and develop flavor, so naturally her salad was bland. She spent the entire rest of the meal pouting and complaining about how bad the bean salad was.
Disgruntled Pelican 1 week ago
We always celebrated Thanksgiving a week early with my paternal grandparents because my grandma had this wonderful tradition of making homemade strudel and that was our Thanksgiving meal. The 5 of us (grandparents, parents, and I) sitting around the table gorging ourselves on the best strudel in existence and having a wonderful time. It would have been 2007 when the grandparents left for the night and were in a car accident where they were rushed to the hospital. They were both ok, but due to their age, we had to move them off the family farm that winter. Grandpa passed 10 months later and we lost Grandma a year after him. I miss them both every day.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 1 week ago
Most "memorable" (not in a good way) was probably 2000, when I was 18. I had just gotten dumped by my first boyfriend and I was inconsolable and depressed, so after lunch I went to hang out with my friends (my family eats Thanksgiving lunch instead of dinner.) Apparently after I left, my dad decided to go up a ladder to help the people we hired to put up Christmas lights. He was in flip-flops and had had a few beers. He fell off of the ladder and sustained a catastrophic brain injury. My mom called me screaming and I arrived home to the firefighters washing blood off of our driveway. My dad was in a coma for 6 months and then emerged fully disabled - bedridden, needed diapers, needed a feeding tube installed, everything. We took care of him at home and I was his primary caregiver for 21 years, until he died in 2021. I just hope he was brain-damaged just enough so that he wasn't aware of how awful his situation was :( My immediate family doesn't really celebrate Thanksgiving any more :x
Sea Squirrel 1 week ago
This is by far the most memorable story overhere. I think everyone who reads it, will remember it. So sad this happened to your family - hug from Holland -
Load More Replies... Damned_Cat 1 week ago
My mother cooked every Thanksgiving meal for 20 years and always the exact same dishes every year, including a three-bean salad. When I got older, I decided to take over the cooking duties one year and make my meal unique with everything made from scratch. When I told mom that I didn't make any bean salad, she just lost it. "What do you mean there's No BeAn SaLad!!!?" We all sit down to eat and the first thing she points out to everyone is that I didn't make bean salad. No one cared and were content with the meal I made. Just as we are serving ourselves, my mother gets up, gets in her car, and drives off. A half-hour later she comes back with all of the ingredients for, of course, the bean salad which she quickly throws together in a bowl and sets it on the table. Usually this salad needs a few hours to chill and develop flavor, so naturally her salad was bland. She spent the entire rest of the meal pouting and complaining about how bad the bean salad was.
Disgruntled Pelican 1 week ago
We always celebrated Thanksgiving a week early with my paternal grandparents because my grandma had this wonderful tradition of making homemade strudel and that was our Thanksgiving meal. The 5 of us (grandparents, parents, and I) sitting around the table gorging ourselves on the best strudel in existence and having a wonderful time. It would have been 2007 when the grandparents left for the night and were in a car accident where they were rushed to the hospital. They were both ok, but due to their age, we had to move them off the family farm that winter. Grandpa passed 10 months later and we lost Grandma a year after him. I miss them both every day.
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