Road Apples by Tim Sanders
Nov. 22, 2010

Thanksgiving quiz

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And now for something completely different.

In the spirit of inclusive, culturally diverse history, this week we are offering a politically correct Thanksgiving Day quiz. Don’t be afraid. There are no wrong answers. While some answers may seem more reasonable than others, we hasten to point out that trying is what counts. We do not keep score around here. That would be judgmental, which we are not. We are, in fact, just barely mental.


• THANKSGIVING DAY WAS DECLARED A NATIONAL HOLIDAY IN ORDER TO:

1. Encourage Americans to give thanks for a “bountiful harvest.”

2. Teach American children who had never seen a wheat field or a single stalk of corn what a “bountiful harvest” was, and how there were several of them, back before federal farm subsidies were introduced.

3. Give Alabamians fair warning that the Iron Bowl was close at hand.

4. Provide schoolchildren and teachers with a much needed break between rounds.
5. Give families a chance to eat a hearty meal and enjoy fellowship with loved ones before rushing out to the mall at 5 a.m. the following morning to engage in vicious hand-to-hand combat over the latest electronic Christmas gift.


• THE PREVIOUS LIST OF ANSWERS CONSISTS OF FIVE, RATHER THAN THE USUAL THREE OR FOUR, ITEMS, DUE TO:

1. Inclusiveness
2. Inflation
3. Ineptitude
4. Daylight Saving Time


• THE PILGRIMS LANDED AT _______ ROCK IN 1620:

1. Little
2. Sand
3. Castle
4. Plymouth
5. I forget


• THE MASSACHUSETTS PILGRIMS WERE BEFRIENDED BY GREGARIOUS, FOOD-LOVING ABORIGINALS FROM A TRIBE KNOWN AS:

1. The Wampanoag tribe
2. The lost tribe of Reuben
3. The Kennedys


• A QUESTION THAT STILL BOTHERS HISTORIANS ABOUT THAT FIRST THANKSGIVING DAY FEAST IS:

1. Were the Pilgrims’ blunderbusses loaded with clumsy schoolchildren?
2. Did the Indians leave Squanto lying around just anywhere, or did they have outhouses?
3. Technically speaking, unless you count Chief Arundi “The Mongoose” Pashkar, weren’t they Native Americans, not Indians?
4. All of the above


• WHERE DID POCAHONTAS FIT INTO THE FIRST THANKSGIVING?

1. She and her dog Rolfe got lost on the way to the feast and wound up somewhere in West Virginia.
2. No wait, she’s the one who led the lost Martin and Lewis expedition down the wide Missouri and northwest through Donner Pass.
3. That happened much later, during the Taft Administration.


• WHAT DID THE PILGRIMS DO AFTER THE FIRST THANKSGIVING FEAST?

1. The women cleared the tables, saved the leftovers, fed scraps to the livestock and washed the dishes.
2. The Pilgrim fathers encouraged them with appreciative endearments like: “Get thee to the fruit cellar, Martha, and fetch me a flagon of good, stout ale!”
3. The Pilgrim fathers leaned back in their chairs, burped, unbuckled their hats, and said “Methinks all that turkey and ale hath made me sleepy. I must nap.”
4. Somewhere around this time was when Massachusetts women developed a powerful interest in witchcraft and began putting little knee breeches and buckled hats on voodoo dolls and poking them repeatedly with very sharp hat pins.


• IF ONE WERE TO BECOME DEATHLY SICK AFTER A TRADITIONAL THANKSGIVING DINNER, THE MOST LIKELY CAUSE WOULD BE:

1. Tryptophan from the traditional turkey meat
2. Severe traditional giblet dressing overdose
4. Salmonella from the traditional cranberry sauce
5. The final score of the traditional Lions game


• WHAT ARE TURKEY GIBLETS?

1. They are baby turkeys.
2. They are small flocks of turkeys.
3. They are the turkey’s personal internal organs.


• THIS IS NOT A HINT, BUT IF YOU WERE TO CHOOSE ANSWER 3 AS YOUR FINAL ANSWER TO THE PREVIOUS QUESTION, THEN WHERE EXACTLY WOULD YOU FIND THE GIBLETS?

1. When you catch a turkey and unzip him, his giblets will be found inside a little paper bag. It is nature’s way of protecting them.
2. Sometimes when you drain a fresh turkey the giblets will appear in the resulting gravy.


• EVERY THANKSGIVING THE PRESIDENT OFFICIALLY PARDONS A TURKEY BECAUSE:

1. The turkey is a proud, handsome bird which symbolizes the freedom we enjoy in this country, and also our soaring economy.
2. No wait, that would be the eagle.
3. And forget the part about the soaring economy.
4. Besides, pardoning a chicken would not be presidential.


• COMPLETE THE FOLLOWING LINE FROM THE BELOVED THANKSGIVING SONG: “OVER THE RIVER AND THROUGH THE WOODS, NOW GRANDMOTHER’S _______ I SPY.”

1. Cat
2. Mercedes
3. Satellite dish
4. New boyfriend, Brad


REMINDER: If you plan to travel by plane over the holiday, please give thanks to those swell folks at the U.S. Transportation Security Administration. You know, the ones who gave you the choice of either a delightful, enhanced pre-flight full body scan or a stimulating pat-down performed by very capable union employees wearing oven mitts who until they were reclassified worked bussing tables in the airport cafeteria.