Growing up with too many cousins to count always made Thanksgiving not just a holiday, but an event. I've managed to develop a tried and true system to survive this particular holiday spent around the table with your family.
1. Start the dinnertime conversation by stating your political opinion right off the bat.
Especially if it contradicts the majority of your family's opinions.
2. Turn awkward conversations into a game.
Whenever someone asks about school or why you haven't managed to find 'a nice young man,' finish your entire glass of wine before answering them.
3. Better yet, when they do ask about your love life, make up a fake boyfriend.
I promise this one will work...well, until they keep asking you questions about him (see #2), you mix up your story and end up just citing the plot of the last romantic comedy you watched.
4. Jump the gun.
Before anyone has time to ask just announce that you'll be dropping out of school to become a stripper. I'm sure no one will be opposed once they find out how much money you can make.
5. Avoid the topic of your future altogether.
You can just be the only one with alcohol sitting at the kids' table.
6. Put as much food on your plate as possible.
So someone makes a comment about how they don't understand how you can eat so much and that one of these days your metabolism will slow down and blah blah blah... but you can't hear them because you're too busy stuffing your face.
7. Just steal the entire basket of monkey bread and keep it in your lap.
No one will even notice, it's a perfect plan.
8. Use holding your baby cousin as an excuse to get out of helping wash dishes.
I promise, out of all your cousins you'll be the only one who thought of this.
9. Complain non-stop about the football game or the parade.
Really whatever is on TV, not that you're even paying attention. You're too busy Snapchatting your best friend about how bored you are while you live tweet about what each of your family members are doing.
10. Take an embarrassing video of that one person who drinks too much.
On second thought, don't do that. It's you, you are the person who drinks too much. Everyone was especially nosy this year and you lost track of how many glasses of wine you'd had.
11. If all else fails just sneak into the kitchen and steal the whole cheesecake.
Because with six other desserts who will even notice? And it's your favorite and last year you fell asleep on the couch and no one woke you up so you didn't even get a piece.
If you follow these steps explicitly you are guaranteed to have the best Thanksgiving ever. Or at the very least that's how you'll remember it, if you remember it.
