God save us all from the Safe White Space. I have not yet found a single casual way to mention my husband's ethnicity early on, but I do it, anyway, because I cannot handle another "greedy gooks" comment without bursting into tears in public. Again.

This makes me squirm, not because of the family arrangement described, but because it underlines how dysfunctional a family I married into. There's nothing but anger and resentment between Mom and Dad, complicated further by some mental health issues and unfortunate decisions, and I do noooot have the serenity to accept these things I cannot change. Stress stress stress. I have a date with all of these links, thx.

I'm pretty OK with plants and I hate to be a cliche, but I mean my mother-in-law has a WHOLE ROOM dedicated to houseplants so you may be on to something here.

At least dried cholla makes a neat trophy corpse, during one's Southwestern goth phase.

That's a pretty fair assessment of family food cultures, yeah. Pig's head wasn't bad! Just tasted like pork, really. I was told the whole hog would be present back in the motherland, but that there are too many logistical hurdles in your average New England kitchen. I don't even buy chicken on the bone, so.

Now that you mention gluten, I guess my immediate family's Thanksgiving is pretty heavily adapted, since my dad and I both have precursors to celiac (grandfather was gluten-free before gluten-free was cool -- or anything but absolutely awful -- because celiac nearly killed him in the '90s, hooray for 21st century dietary bandwagons). But that's just exclusion, so I don't even think about it anymore -- I mean, we're still eating pie, it's just a more complicated crust. I guess the paleo thing blew my mind because even our adapted food is SO UNHEALTHY and I can't imagine it being any other way. What kind of wizard concocts a version of this meal that will not kill you, etc.

Haha! Your footnote is the exact reason I took some offense to "white people," yes! Holy diverse family, though, Batman. Is there any kosher way to say that I get the warmest of fuzzies when people describe families like yours?? Just because my husband and I are such a novelty where we live (and in both sides of the family, save my brother-in-law and his wife all their thousands of miles away) and I get all fluttery when I remember that yes, cool, this happens elsewhere and is not a burp in the universe?!! I can't think of an unweird to say that! Sorry.

"Bisexual women are delightsome and enchanting and a hell of a lot of fun."

;_; ilu

Terrible fathers have always been the secret ingredient in Disney magic (because the dead mothers were never a secret). Thank you for finally calling out the lurking bastards who've been sliding under the radar all these years.

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy! I didn't even know there was an email thingie. That's handy. I only see replies on the intensedebate page.

Oh man, spring rolls for every occasion sounds pretty great. I was actually thinking more of the "white people" comment than the lumpia, but no offense was taken either way (ok a little tiny bit of offense was taken at the "white people" thing because of reasons). It honestly hadn't occurred to me to think "Filipino food" and that was actually the interesting part to me? Maybe my family's food culture is weird. I would've clarified if I'd known about email notifications, probably. You know what conspicuously Filipino food I see the most of at gatherings, though? Roasted pig heads. That, and a rice stick dish my MIL makes, but I'm not sure how to spell the name. But seriously, rice stick is never gonna beat out finding a roasted pig's head at the "family reception" the day after your wedding. (Not that it was alarming or whatever, I just thought it was cool. I'm from Austin, so I'm used to finding uncooked pig's heads in grocery stores in the right parts of town and always wondered what you do with it.)

Southern Thanksgiving can be so different from Northeastern Thanksgiving and I'm so fascinated by the idea of being able to do it paleo. Paleo's not my thing because I have issues with food, but just the theory of it is interesting. I'm legit sitting here, thinking of ways to do it.

woo yeah sushi cat party A+

I hate every job but this reminds me that I hate cool jobs the most.

Maria Bamford is the patron saint of temps. Like, last time a plucky little company said that to me, the CEO blocked my full-time job offer because I'm fat, which, OK, if you guys want to be different, refuse to hire me because the Oracle found me wanting or something. Whatever. There was a lot of exposed brick.

Wow I wish I'd been around to actually see these comments months ago. I'm gonna answer, anyway, because fuck it.

No! Sometimes there's turducken, but I think that's a novelty thing and they haven't done it with me around. I think it's interesting that people assume I'm implying ethnic cuisine, though! Mostly I'm differentiating because technically the first-generation-ers are children and new babies, so the Filipino family does more TV-traditional than my Southern, gravyfied family.

No one's reading this but cool icon, what what.

/streaks