How to Survive Thanksgiving

PHOTO COURTESY FLICKR.com Tim Sackton | Oh how I envy the turkey, no one’s asking how its semester is going.
PHOTO COURTESY Flickr Tim Sackton |
Oh how I envy the turkey, no one’s asking how its semester is going.

Thanksgiving can be a time to relax with family and loved ones, a time to catch up on the lives of others and a time to stuff your face with turkey, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie.

Sometimes, though, it can feel like getting together with the entire family for Thanksgiving is an interview process.

Let’s face it, not many college students want to talk about school during a quick but much-needed reprieve from it.

If you find yourself being bombarded with questions about how college is going or if you are accosted by a noisy or otherwise awful relative, there are a few things you can do to attempt an escape.

There is the classic, “I think I heard someone calling my name” technique, which won’t always work but could be worth a shot.

If you don’t feel like chatting with a weird aunt or uncle for an hour, you can act as though you have just returned from a semester abroad, and no longer speak the same language as said relative.

Given that it will be Thanksgiving, you could use food to your advantage by stuffing your mouth full of your favorite turkey day treat as you see a relative approaching, so as to appear occupied and unable (more like unwilling) to talk.

If all else fails, make a beeline for the bathroom and stay in there until the incessant family member retreats.

If they do not, and proceed to ask you questions about your life, school, relationships, grades or anything else of the sort, through the bathroom door, then you better hope the bathroom you withdrew to is on the main level, and has a window.

If it is on the main level and has an escape route, you are in luck.

From here, you can open a window and flee your nuisance of a relative without looking back.

You might even feel inclined to yell “Hallelujah, sweet freedom,” and that is perfectly okay.

Now, if you wound up fleeing to a bathroom with no easy escape path this is where you have to get creative.

I would recommend ripping off the shower curtains and fashioning them into a rope ladder of some sort.

Tying towels together is also an option, but it may be more time consuming, and you are looking for a quick and relatively easy way out.

After you have created your makeshift ladder, tie it to a grounded object and proceed to rappel yourself down the side of the house or wherever you are.

But, if none of the tips above appeal to you when it comes to avoiding your weird relatives and their persistent questions, do what most of us do: answer each and every one of their questions with a smile.

 

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