And so they dined on mashed potatoes and green bean casserole and King’s Hawaiian dinner rolls like true kings themselves, having successfully evaded the King of England knowing that he’d never send troops all the way across the Atlantic Ocean after them.

Here are a few more fun facts about the first Thanksgiving that you might enjoy…

• Many pilgrims actually ate ham instead of turkey for the first Thanksgiving because they put off their grocery shopping until the last minute and the stores were all sold out.
• Although the first Thanksgiving was surprisingly without the family arguments it’s become known for today, this was mostly due to the fact that the orneriest of pilgrims died of scurvy on the ride over.
• Pilgrims are iconically known to wear hats with belt buckles on them due to an embarrassing mishap at the tailor’s that nobody had the guts to admit.
• The tradition of saying a blessing before dinner also happened quite by accident as one pilgrim was observed in saying, “Oh god, I hope we didn’t forget to turn the iron off back in England…”
• Some patriots are critical that prominent Founding Fathers George Washington and John Adams didn’t even attend the first Thanksgiving, despite the fact that neither would be born for another 110 years.
• Native Americans were welcomed to the pilgrims’ feast both as a sign of gratitude for teaching them how to farm for crops in their new land as well as for their innate ability to carve festive holiday animals out of butter.
• The first pumpkin pie was actually created using a mixture of those pumpkin-shaped candy corns and some orange food coloring, and people loved it so much that the next year they decided to try the real thing!
• The guy who invented stuffing was arrested and charged with multiple counts of animal abuse, yet the classic recipe still remains popular to this day.

The post Fun Facts from the Internet About the First Thanksgiving appeared first on Just Laugh.

“In a way it’s kind of like a reverse Hunger Games,” complained veteran turkey Al Gobble. “Out of all of us, one turkey will be pardoned by the President and sent on his merry way, and the rest of us will all be sentenced to be eaten by hordes of hungry Americans in this celebration of theirs. It’s really kind of %#^$-ed up if you think about it…”

Each year the President of the United States celebrates a few days before the Thanksgiving holiday by pardoning one lucky turkey and allowing it to live out the remainder of its days on a farm without fear of being eaten. Once this presidential tradition concludes, however, millions of the remaining turkeys are hopelessly slaughtered and stuffed with breadcrumbs to be served alongside mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce while Americans argue about their political choices before going out to stand in lines all night in search of cheap prices for Christmas gifts.

The post 46 Million Turkeys Nervously Await Presidential Pardon appeared first on Just Laugh.

Seriously – the guy from The Apprentice. “You’re fired?”

I guess it was a little catchier back when he was just sitting on a gold-encrusted throne in the boardroom of Trump Tower instead of the Oval Office where he’s likely to face challenges a little bigger than trying to make Bret Michaels and Omarosa get along, but hey, I’m sure everything will work out just fine, right?!

Needless to say, with the country literally divided in half for pretty much the most significant election of our lifetime, that Thanksgiving dinner this year where we gather the family red and blue alike around the table in celebration of gratitude or some nonsense is likely to be just a wee bit intense in homes where the entire lot of them weren’t all collectively aboard the Trump Train…

…with the railroad industry being one of the few that Donald Trump hasn’t declared bankruptcy in yet…

This humble list of suggestions I present to you in an attempt to make peace at dinner tables across America – at least until the family unbuckles their pants and falls asleep from overindulgence on turkey and stuffing and pumpkin pie like our Founding Fathers intended.

• Respect the political differences you have with your relatives by never looking them directly in the eye and muttering expletives under your breath when they’re just out of earshot.
• Subtly work in the hashtag #TurkeyLivesMatter when you’re saying the family blessing.
• Prepare a list of pre-approved discussion topics for the dinner table that everyone can enjoy, including subjects like “Wasn’t the turkey more moist last year?” and “Please tell me you bought more than one box of wine…”
• Try not to bring up the fact that if the Indians had only built a 50-foot wall of solid concrete along the eastern seaboard, maybe none of this would’ve ever happened.
• Refrain from calling your Aunt Meredith a xenophobic fascist – at least until after she passes the sweet potato casserole.
• If you need to take a moment during your delicious Thanksgiving meal, feel free to weep silently into the cranberry sauce … nobody’s going to eat that stuff anyways.
• Ixnay on the opular vote-pay.
• Don’t throw food at your siblings for supporting Trump; throw food at them for chasing you around the backyard with the garden hose when you were seven.
• Celebrate the commonalities associated with Thanksgiving that we can all appreciate – things like overeating and pumpkin pie and sitting on our butts while somebody else does the dishes!
• And if nothing else, never underestimate the power of stuffing your ears full of mashed potatoes and chanting, “La la la – maybe the electors will still pick Hillary anyways…” over and over again until it’s time to go Black Friday shopping.

The post Tips for Surviving Thanksgiving Dinner, 2016 Edition appeared first on Just Laugh.

Of course, just like any bar mitzvah, this turkey-laden holiday can be a minefield of indigestion and political dissent if one isn’t prepared with the kid gloves and iron stomach an event of this magnitude requires, but thankfully for you, we here at Just Laugh have put together this convenient, bulleted list of precisely what you need to remember in order to make it to Black Friday relatively unscathed and thus ready to shop until your dinner is properly digested…

• Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes with gravy – these are your tools to tolerate being around your extended family for an entire afternoon. Also, lots and lots of red wine. LOTS.
• When someone asks you to pass the rolls, just do it. No one needs your four-minute dissertation about the suffering of wheat farmers in Darfur every time that they need a stinking roll, Janet.
• Be sure to give thanks that you’re not a pilgrim because those guys had to make all of this food by hand! Also, something like 60% of them died of scurvy, which was probably also a bit of a downer around the holidays…
• When setting the table, remember that forks go on the left and guns go on the right. Because this is America, damn it.
• Much like WarGames, the only way to win a debate about politics at the dinner table is not to play. Or be willing to scald your opponent with hot gravy when your Republican uncle starts being ridiculous – either strategy is traditionally acceptable.
• For the 800th time, why do we even bother buying cranberry sauce again???
• It’s not actually the tryptophan in the turkey that makes you sleepy on Thanksgiving – it’s the fact that you just ate three days worth of food in the better part of an hour and still have the gall to say that you’re “holding back” to leave room for dessert.
• If you don’t eat at least three pieces of assorted pies for dessert over the course of the evening, you’re an absolute monster who’s definitely not getting invited back for Christmas.

The post Just Laugh’s Guide to Surviving Thanksgiving Dinner appeared first on Just Laugh.

“At first I thought that it was pretty swell when they brought over some marshmallows and brown sugar to arrange around our display because we hardly ever get to see those guys,” cited long-time sweet potato Jerry Carville, “but when Henry pointed out the recipe cards for something called Aunt Gina’s Marshmallow Sweet Potato Surprise, we got the feeling that it wasn’t going to be the type of event that would have us all jumping out to say ‘Surprise!’…”

“If I didn’t know better,” told concerned sweet potato Janet Mayberry, “I’d say that our friends and family are being shuttled out of here by the pound for something other than a festive table arrangement or to go live in the dirt of a nice family in the suburbs!”

Though the collective pile of potatoes dared not to say the words, it was clear what was on everyone’s minds as they noticed patrons rubbing their bellies and filling their carts with cranberries and stuffing and even bizarre balls of meat that strangely resembled the live turkeys that they’d known from their days on the farm. Something just wasn’t right about the whole experience, and together these sweet potatoes have vowed to get to the bottom of it – with or without toasted marshmallows on top.

The post Sweet Potatoes Have a Bad Feeling About This appeared first on Just Laugh.