Canadian vs. American Thanksgiving

I *finally* think I'm reaching the end of my flu. Thank goodness. Unfortunately, it worsened over the weekend, but I felt better today, and so hopefully with another good night of sleep (or several good nights of sleep lol) I'll be back to normal :)

Since getting sick though, I've had several huge changes in my appetite. I guess this is to be expected when you are sick, but one of them is *major* and those of you who have ever lived with me will appreciate it: I have completely lost my taste for tea!! I know!! It's crazy - I cannot even believe I'm saying that, but it's true! I have not had a cup of tea (or craved a cup of tea) since last Tuesday or so. I know this might sound silly, but I have seriously not gone a day in about 4 years without drinking a cup (or several cups) of tea or at least craving one! I'll have to see how I feel about tea when I no longer have the flu, but at least for right now, tea is the *last* thing I want!


Two "new" foods I've come to love over the past couple of days that I've never really eaten much of before are (1) oatmeal and (2) toast with peanut butter and bananas on top - has anyone ever tried that?? I've had it before, but for some reason I think I failed to appreciate how amazing it is until now! In fact, I'm eating a piece right now! lol

SOOO good!!

I'm really glad to have found at least some foods that taste good to me now - being sick is never fun, but especially when you really don't want to eat anything. I'm really hoping I get my normal appetite back in time for Thanksgiving, though - one of my friends who lives in NY invited me to come spend American Thanksgiving with her and her family, and I'm really looking forward to it! I say "American" Thanksgiving because (some of you might already know this) Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving on the second Monday of October, so no one is going to be celebrating in Ottawa this coming Thursday. So it will be nice to get back to the States and be with a family (even if it can't be my own!) to celebrate the holiday :)

I was talking to one of my Canadian classmates the other day about the differences between American Thanksgiving and Canadian Thanksgiving. She told me that at least from her "Canadian" perspective, it seems like the Americans make a WAY bigger deal about Thanksgiving than the Canadians do. I agreed that there is a lot of "hype" around the holiday in America with the Macy's Day Parade, etc., but said that it really depends on the individual family as to how "big of a deal" it is. Then, she asked me if it was really true that we have a "Black Friday" the day after Thanksgiving. lol Yes, I said, we definitely have a Black Friday. Apparently, there is nothing like that in Canada. Although, the day after Christmas (what they call Boxing Day) is kinda similar - not anywhere near as extreme, but the stores have a lot of sales, she said.

Even just looking at this picture stresses me out lol I've never gone shopping on Black Friday, and I have no plans to do so in the future haha If it doesn't stress you out, then more power to you, but I'd rather be at home watching a movie and drinking some hot chocolate (not tea!) and maybe baking some Black Forest Cake too ;)

We also talked about the differences in foods served at American Thanksgiving and Canadian Thanksgiving, and it seemed to us that there were not too many differences in the "traditional" menu items: turkey, stuffing (or dressing), cranberry sauce, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, etc. The one difference we did come up with though was that in Canada, they don't have yams or sweet potatoes, while in the US, both those are considered "traditional" Thanksgiving dishes. But other than that, it seemed about the same.

YUM :)

I hope all of you are feeling well and flu-less! And I hope you are all looking forward to what will hopefully be a delicious, relaxing Thanksgiving! I hope my parents are prepared to celebrate Thanksgiving again when I come home because even though it'll be nice to be with my friends, it's not the same without my own family!

I'll do another post soon about what we made in class this past Friday: Yule logs!

It says "Joyeux Noel" or "Merry Christmas"!