Tomorrow marks one week until our yearly stuff-my-face fest that we call Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving has been an annual tradition since 1863, when, during the Civil War, PresidentAbraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of “Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens”, to be celebrated on Thursday, November 26.  The first Thanksgiving was celebrated by the Pilgrims after their first harvest.

In this day and age Thanksgiving is seen as a day, or for some, a few days of family getting together enjoying being with one another, and eating really good food.

And maybe getting chased around the farmyard by a pissed off fowl.  But not usually.  Most of us get our turkeys either from a local farmer, a farm market, or out of the frozen food section of our grocery store.  Some of us call the Butterball hotline to make sure that we are cooking it correctly, that we aren’t going to give said family food poisoning.  Most of us don’t.  Most turkeys are oven roasted.

Some are deep fried.

As a side note, did you know nearly 4,300 fires occur on Thanksgiving causing 15 deaths and almost $27 million in property damage, many of them due to deep frying accidents?

Just a thought.

Anyhooters…..this coming weekend is going to be crazy in the grocery stores.  Most families are going to be doing the majority of their shopping starting Sunday.  Monday will be a slow day, and then it will start up again on Tuesday and Wednesday.  If you can plan your shopping accordingly, don’t shop on Tuesday and Wednesday unless you absolutely need to.  Just a friendly word of advice from someone who has lived this reality for 35 years.

And one last thing…..please remember that there are hundreds of thousands of active duty military that will not be sitting with their families on Thanksgiving.  Please remember them in your blessing that day, and every day.