6 Measurements Of How Close Thanksgiving and Christmas Are

In Canada, Thanksgiving is in October. Some Americans make fun of that.

'Thanksgiving in October? Oh man. When is your Christmas? 2017?! hahahaha!'

Make fun of the way Canada does Thanksgiving, but it happens a good two months before Christmas. In America? Not the same. Thanksgiving and Christmas are smashed together. Don't think Thanksgiving and Christmas are too close together? Here are some units of distant between the two. 

Four Weeks

There are four weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas in America. That's it. Four weeks. You have to give half of that time as notice to quit your job at Jamba Juice. If you gave double the notice, it would be Christmas. You give double notice on Thanksgiving? You are walking out of Jamba Juice with your last Kale/Eggnog smoothie on Saint Nicholas's big day. 

730 Hours

That is how many hours are in a month. 730 hours is the distant from Thanksgiving to Christmas. 730 hours after smashing turkey into your body, you are sitting on a floor opening presents under a tree that you smashed into your house. 730 hours after yelling at Aunt Bev to stop beaking about her embroidered sweater and pass the cranberries, you're yelling at Aunt Bev to put out her embroidered sweater that burst into flames because she dipped her arm into candle. Doesn't seem like enough time between the two. 

317 Viewings of The Dark Knight

Right after Thanksgiving, you think 'Screw it. I'm going to lay under a blanket with my bag in a tub of butter, and watch The Dark Knight until Christmas.' Well, you should know that you can only watch The Dark Knight 317 times between Thanksgiving and Christmas in America. 'What? But that's not enough time to REALLY get a deep buttering of my bag' you think to yourself. That's right. It isn't. You have to give more notice than this to move out of an apartment. You have to give 634 viewings of The Dark Knight notice to leave a building, but for some reason half of those viewings are fine distant between two super holidays. 

Two Maybe Three Gas Tank Fill Ups

Let's say you just use your car to cruise around your town. You're not hauling banana's across the country. You're not setting out on some sort of 'have to see Mount Rushmore AND Miami in the same day' adventure. You are just going to and from work, five days a week. You'll hit that gas station three times. In that time, two major holidays have happened. You hop in your car after Thanksgiving, drive around your village, the third time you hit that gas station, it's Christmas. Maybe two. You'll be at a pump, 'Jumping Christ! It's Christmas! I didn't get anybody anything. Hope they like gas station hot dogs and beef jerky. Thank you, Wawa! It's a Christmas miracle.'

13,904 Listens of RhineStone Cowboy

You can ONLY listen to Country Music Superstar's Glenn Campbell sing Rhinestone Cowboy 13,904 times between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That's insane. Day after Thanksgiving, you lock your iPhone into Rhinestone Cowboy, gear that sucker up 13,904 times, and it's Christmas. Hey, you might love the song enough that the first listen is Christmas. But you'd be an idiot and wrong. It's 13,904 til Christmas. 

Really Long Arms

If you had SUPER long arms, you could reach from Thanksgiving to Christmas. Easy. I mean, you need REALLY long arms. Arms long enough to reach into the future and bring two days with some distance between them together, but, it COULD be done. Arms that break the space time continuum and reach towards a day in the future or past, depending on where you are at the time? POSSible between these two days. 

Twitter @nathanmacintosh

Thanksgiving's and Sale days.

A lot of people in America have asked me if Canada does Thanksgiving. Sure. Do we do it in November? Nope. It's the second Monday of October. How come? Because in 1957, the Parliament of Canada decided we should have a celebration for our harvest. And they decided that it would be in October. Yep. That's it. It's not because we're celebrating the day that Canadians killed aboriginal people. Which happened but not like that. The British came over to Canada, killed the people that lived there, and then that country became Canada. So, instead of celebrating that, Thanksgiving in Canada was just a decided day. 

"Hey, in America they have a day where they celebrate the killing of people."

"Hmmm. They take the whole day off?"

"Yep."

"Huh. We need a day like that. How about we celebrate the killing of crops that we harvest?"

"Well, little softer, but I like it. What will we call it?"

"What are you talking about? Thanksgiving. They have it, and it's working. So, Thanksgiving."

"What about Harvest Day? Or Holi-Tober?"

"... Do you hear yourself?"

And is Canadian Thanksgiving celebrated the same? Yes. Turkey, gravy, stuffing. All of it. It's the same day. Except in America it's a lot more important of a Holiday. In Canada it's not as huge. Take it this way, in Canada families have Thanksgiving dinner on the Sunday Or Monday. The actual Holiday is Monday, but people might celebrate it on Sunday. That's how serious it is. 

"Holiday is tomorrow."

"Cool. Want to do it today? I'm hungry now."

"Sure. Let me get my sweatpants on."

You can celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving any day that weekend if you want. Can't really do that with other Holidays. 

"Alright. It's Christmas eve, kids. Christmas tomorrow. But look, screw that. I don't want to do it then. Let's get this thing over with."

"But Dad! Santa hasn't come yet!"

"You kidding me? Santa picked this stuff up in November. Alright, I'll open them. Here you go, Chris. A sweater."

"AHHHHhhhhh!"

"Stop crying. You know there are kids on this planet who don't even HAVE parents opening their gifts and throwing them at them. Now enjoy!"

One big difference between the two holidays is that in America Thanksgiving is right before the big sale day. Black Friday. In Canada, Thanksgiving is not tied to our big sale day. We have Boxing day, our big sale day, the day after Christmas. Good and bad to both. With Black Friday, all of your Christmas gifts you get were probably on sale. Someone probably was punched in the face for you to have that Blu Ray collection. 

"Merry Christmas!"

"Thanks!... Um, there's blood on this."

"Oh, yeah. Some idiot reached for it when I did, so Judo kicked him through a display case. He landed on some glass ornaments, and blood must have flew through the air and landed on your gift. I was too busy running from the fire someone started in mobile audio to notice. Anyway, Merry Christmas!"

Since Boxing Day in Canada is the day after Christmas, you get to see the gift you bought someone for Christmas, is a hundred dollars less the very next day.

"Are you kidding me? They don't think I need that hundred bucks? Why don't we just make Christmas Dec 27th? I mean for god sakes."

For years there have been stories about people being trampled on Black Friday. Boxing Day? Not really the same. I don't remember seeing tons of stories of Canadians stomping on each other at Zellers to get forty dollars off of a bike. I'm not sure why. Maybe one reason is because it's Canada. I think one reason is that Black Friday is before Christmas. People NEED these gifts. You NEED these discounts for the upcoming Holiday. With the thought of having nothing under the tree, and that old woman in front of you, that old woman has to go. Since Boxing Day is after Christmas, it's a little more casual. I used to work in the home theatre department of a Future Shop, which is owned by Best Buy, same thing really, and I worked a Boxing Day. Getting there at five in the morning, blizzard out, people had been shovelling their own path out to stand in, and one guy had hot chocolate he was handing to people. HANDING it out. Not throwing it in peoples faces. Black Friday? Who knows.

"Hey, man. That's pretty nice of you. Bringing hot chocolate for everyone in this line. That's just great. I'll have half a ..... AAAAAHHHHH! Right in my face! Why?!"

"I need that Lego set! Third degree burn bandit strikes again!"

Twitter @nathanmacintosh