# Happy Cranks-giving! (November mini-rants)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Tags:** monthly-mini-rant
**Created:** [November 1, 2025, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477 "2025-11-01T14:32:21Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 17
### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/321 "2025-11-24T19:59:32Z")
George Michael? Of course not. I’ll never get sick of that track.
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### Author:  [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/322 "2025-11-24T20:16:56Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#):
>
> That’s fine, just don’t take away “Last Christmas.”
> [@Atamasama](#):
>
> George Michael? Of course not. I’ll never get sick of that track.
You don’t participate in Whamagetton, I take it.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/323 "2025-11-24T21:26:12Z")
the feathered fans intrigue me…was there some sort of vegas show thing? burlesque? vaudeville?
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/324 "2025-11-24T22:23:13Z")
I have no idea! I’m waiting for videos to surface.
You guys, this isn’t even the weirdest one I’ve ever been to.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/325 "2025-11-24T22:49:16Z")
No goats this time?
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/326 "2025-11-24T22:52:09Z")
No, but they strongly encouraged us to dress up as clowns.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/327 "2025-11-24T22:55:01Z")
Then when you nod carefully while backing away slowly.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/328 "2025-11-24T23:01:52Z")
Okay, this party just took a turn. The guests were asked to resemble clowns?!? Not clown entertainers?
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/329 "2025-11-24T23:02:49Z")
> [@rocking\_chair](#):
>
> Okay, this party just took a turn.
I gathered the “clown party” was a previous event, not the most recent one.
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [November 24, 2025, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/330 "2025-11-24T23:36:16Z")
> [@rocking\_chair](#):
>
> Okay, this party just took a turn. The guests were asked to resemble clowns?!? Not clown entertainers?
Yeah, clowns were a previous party. There were contortionists and unicyclers and they rolled out basically like a giant wardrobe of clown paraphernalia and instructed everyone to dig in. And a lot of people did. We talked about that one for a long time.
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### Author:  [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/331 "2025-11-25T01:41:02Z")
Quite the in laws there.
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/332 "2025-11-25T03:01:19Z")
Fortunately my husband was raised by two sane-ish people. Sort of. Hmm, let me put it this way. Out of all the grandkids, he got the best parents. This is admittedly damning with faint praise. They like to say that my husband got the best parts of both of them and I think it’s absolutely true. I love both of them and they love us and that’s more than I can say for my own parents.
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### Author:  [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/333 "2025-11-25T12:57:29Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#):
>
> No, but they strongly encouraged us to dress up as clowns.
Awww, man, I wish I was [invited](https://www.flickr.com/photos/74663312@N08/53074723537/) to that party. 😢🤡
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/334 "2025-11-25T14:31:49Z")
Eh, I think finding a good parking spot in Derry is a pain.
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### Author:  [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/335 "2025-11-25T20:49:34Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#):
>
> What really lies at the bottom of is that I hate parties. I hate crowds and noise and super loud music and surface-level conversation and drunk people and basically everything about parties.
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#):
>
> It’s much easier to feel like I belong when we are together in someone’s home and it’s smaller and we can be just people. It’s much harder for me to feel like I belong at one of their fancy parties.
I think everyone here would join me in presenting you with a Get-Out-Of-Parties card.
Even going to one party a year (quiet holiday “do” at the Dean’s house), I could take it for about a half hour. Then I’d wander to an abandoned part of the house and find a bookcase with something more interesting.
My wife wouldn’t even do that. She just raised a cynical eyebrow when I asked her if she wanted to come.
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### Author:  [@InsomniaMama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InsomniaMama)
#### Post date: [November 25, 2025, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/336 "2025-11-25T23:59:18Z")
I’m super crunchy. Lots of native plants, compost, etc. etc.
Every year people bitch about leaf blowers and people not saving every fucking leaf for the insects. I swear to fucking god, these people must only have one tree.
We have 2 giant oaks, 4 big maples, 12 smaller trees. We leave what we can! We can’t leave every leaf. I feel like I’m wandering into tongue twister territory here.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 26, 2025, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/337 "2025-11-26T00:28:33Z")
“Convivophobia” is often listed as a “fear of parties”. It’s not an official diagnosis, as it’s really just a term to describe a narrow form of social anxiety disorder, but you can absolutely look up the term on Google and find stuff written about it as if it’s a legitimate phobia, so just tell people you suffer from it and for your own mental health you are not allowed to attend them.
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### Author:  [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)
#### Post date: [November 26, 2025, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/338 "2025-11-26T01:19:14Z")
I do actually have social anxiety disorder, which the cousins are at least aware of and cool about, but this family is so big it’s hard to do anything with them without some kind of party happening. I already attend all the kids’ birthday parties and my husband insists on having something for our son every year. A lot of the pressure comes from him, honestly. If I don’t go and he goes, he has to wrangle the kid on his own and doesn’t get to talk to his family.
This recent event was pretty much mandatory. The only people who got out of it lived in other states. It’s been a long time since they’ve done professional family photos so to miss that would be seen as an insult. Even my husband was stressed about getting the photos perfect and he rarely sweats any event. He was most stressed about the giant group shot - 55 people,12 small children, but we came through that one faster than expected. The photographers were exceptional. They were great with my son, too.
Some parties I can get out of, some I really can’t. I’m mostly resigned to make the best of it. It’s not their fault there are so many of them, is it?
Next up is the annual family Christmas party which combines all three grand matriarchs and their families. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the flu.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [November 26, 2025, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/339 "2025-11-26T01:20:07Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#):
>
> I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the flu.
Just start licking doorknobs, only way to be sure!
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### Author:  [@Seanette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seanette)
#### Post date: [November 26, 2025, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/happy-cranks-giving-november-mini-rants/1024477/340 "2025-11-26T01:28:49Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#):
>
> I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the flu.
Take public transit, hang out in a doctor’s office or pharmacy, find a reason to be around groups of young kids….
I teach a children’s class at church, and as much as I love kids, one downside is that I catch just about everything making the rounds. Kids are great, but they’re little germ factories.
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