Oh KateX What a beautiful spread. Almost to pretty to eat.....

Haha.. OK here it is.. so it was late Nov 1995.. I had just moved to the USA to start a 6 month fellowship at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor in January of 1996 and was getting settled in.

I had rented a room from another student in his apartment and he had gone home for the week.. he wasn't a very communicative type, I think he maybe grunted at me the 3 times the whole time I lived there (physics geek).

Now I'd learned in the few weeks I'd been there that Ann Arbor is a pretty buzzing town with students all over, so one day when I went out to get some groceries before the weekend it seemed a bit odd that it was very quiet. I lived on 3rd street just 3 blocks from Main street and I didn't see a single car on the road. As I got to main street I realized there was not a single person out.. huh. I get to the little convenience store to pick up some bits..and it was all locked up..mmm.. really odd... then I realised EVERYTHING was closed and there were literally ZERO people around. WTH... was it a Sunday and I lost track of the days? Had I gotten up earlier than I thought? Like 6am? No the sun was high in the sky..

I kept walking and the whole campus was a GHOST TOWN. What in the almighty had happened? It was spooky.. bizarre.. even getting scary. All the buildings were locked up and not a living soul to be seen to ask what was going on.. I wandered around a bit in mild panic with utter crazy shit going through my head. Was a nuclear bomb coming?? (Us brits always heard about American kids being trained to get under their desks at school coz well.. that's America you know). I mean what on earth could explain an ENTIRE university town being desolate on some random Thursday in November????? I went back to the apartment and switched on the news. I saw 10 million people in NYC watching balloons float down 6th Ave... WHAAAAAAAAAT????

In those days no one had heard of Thanksgiving in the UK.. now of course they have black Friday sales and all the associated nonsense.. but I can tell you I was FREAKED THE HECK OUT! 😆

Hey! KateX waiting for your (scary) first U.S. Thanksgiving Day Story!!!!