Citing little more than a close geographic proximity and having several genes in common, the Thurstons and their extended family came together on October 13 to argue around a dining room table, punctuated by intermittent periods of eating turkey.

“Everyone’s so busy off doing their own thing,” explained Mr. Thurston, between courses of delicious family gossip, “so it’s really great whenever we can come together and really get under each other’s skin. Yelling at each other over the phone just isn’t the same.

“The great thing about family is that we’ve all known each other for so long that we never run out of skeletons to bring up or things to complain about. We can be as cruel and unforgiving in our table talk as we want without fear people will resent us because, well, we’re family. We’re stuck with each other regardless of what happens.”

The excessive feast — prepared almost entirely by Mrs. Thurston over 12 gruelling hours, who wished to offer her thanks to “no one” for helping — went largely unnoticed as most family members took the opportunity to air grievances they’d been simmering over since April.

Mr. Thurston continued: “We only get together a handful of times throughout the year. Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving. That’s not a lot of chances to make off-handed comments about who’s raising their kids better, or subtly bring up who makes more money. Holidays are really all about family.”

Thanksgiving — a holiday meant to commemorate early Pilgrims who came to America in the 16th century — is traditionally celebrated in Canada by eating too many buttered up carbs and consuming processed foods to the point of exhaustion, followed by accidentally falling asleep on the couch while everyone makes surface-level small talk.

While having an uncle get blackout drunk during the festivities is also a tradition at Canadian Thanksgivings, the Thurstons opted not to have one this year and simply didn’t invite Uncle Richard.

Though tensions remained high for most of the gluttonous feeding period, family members agreed that the turkey “wasn’t as dry as last year” and that the ritualistic offering would be enough to quell their  inevitable self-destruction until the next gathering in December.