THIS IS WHAT THE GREAT HAM INCIDENT OF THANKSGIVING 2021 LOOKED LIKE
Please tell me more about the Great Ham Incident of Thanksgiving 2021. I wish to be amused by your calamity.
OK SO
We have a couple of people in the family who either don’t care for turkey, or really like ham, so at family holidays where Turkey is traditional, we usually have both. In this case, my father bought a honeybaked ham (that’s precooked, for non-US folks).
“There isn’t enough room in the oven for that and everything else I have to cook,” said my mother.
“That’s okay,” said my father. “We’ll warm it up on the grill.”
Cut to:
I’m sitting across the table from my cousin’s wife, who 1) is well known for her love of ham and 2) has a view out the window to the deck, when I see her eyes widen.
“The ham is on fire!” she cries.
“WHAT?” cry assorted family members.
“SAVE THE HAM!” she shouts, and runs out the back door.
My father does the most American thing he has ever done in his life, and I’m counting his military service in this: he walks calmly outside to the grill and douses the ham with a can of beer.
“If the ham and I were both on fire, she probably still would’ve been yelling ‘save the ham,’” Cousin mutters.
“Obviously,” I say. “You can put yourself out and the ham cannot.”
“YEAH, KEVIN,” says Cousin’s Wife.
We all turn to the Canadian guest who came to the party along with Cousin and Cousin’s Wife and is watching all this with fascination. “Well,” I say, “now you can tell everyone you’ve been to a real American Thanksgiving.”
