There are the regulars: her writer, Larry Amoros; publicist Scott Currie; writer Nancy Collins; neighbors Cynthia and Fred Maltese; and gossip grande dame Aileen Mehle. (Here’s a hint: always try and score a seat next to Aileen. The woman knows everyone and everything.) And there are the people who make appearances every other year, like Blaine Trump, Amir and Tas Dossal, who work for the U.N., or the occasional Broadway actress or singer.

It’s always interesting, and this year was no different. After crowdsourcing what to wear on Twitter (I chose a red dress), I showed up at Joan’s Upper East Side enclave only to be faced with a reality crew—Joan and Melissa were shooting this year’s feast as part of their WE TV show Joan Knows Best—that was crowding the Versailles-themed living room and dining room.

Cocktails are served from 5:30 to 6:30. The dinner, which many people eat at 3 p.m., starts so late as Joan spends the day every year delivering food for God’s Love We Deliver. Joan’s comedian friends Tony and Lynne, who are featured on Joan Knows Best and notoriously don’t get along, spent that part of the evening on opposite sides of the room while Joan exhorted the more outgoing guests to interact with the shyer ones. (It is everyone’s duty at Joan’s dinners to make everyone else feel interesting and exciting.) And then Joan, dressed in a black sparkly dressing gown with a feather ruff—literally—rang the dinner gong.

This year I was sat at Joan’s end of the table. I’m usually with Caroline near Melissa’s end—they bookend it. Aileen reminisced about Ari Onassis and Maria Callas, Joan talked Donald Trump, and if I was still a gossip columnist I could have filled the column for weeks. But the best part of the evening is always the annual tradition where everyone has to stand up and say what they are thankful for, with one caveat from Joan: “No thanking me for being at this table or being invited! That’s bullshit—not allowed!”

What are you planning on cooking this year for the holiday, at home or at your restaurant?

Always at home. If people are coming over, I like to do the turkey, but I encourage my friends to bring over whatever side dishes and desserts are traditional for them.

You grew up in Ethiopia and Sweden—does this whole Thanksgiving tradition seem bizarre to you, or is the holiday growing on you?

I love Thanksgiving because it’s a holiday that is centered around food and family, two things that are of utmost importance to me. It’s such a great time to reflect on the year and reach out to those who are not as fortunate, and I encourage my friends to do their part.

The “turkey means sleep” trope has been with us a while and has been debunked for just about the same duration but is still worth reviewing. The premise is this: turkey is chock-full of a soporific essential amino acid, tryptophan, one of the 22 essential amino acids. These amino acids are “essential” because our body cannot synthesize them; to maintain a blood level, we have to ingest tryptophan daily. So tryptophan at pretty big doses is a routine part of being a human on planet Earth. Despite this relatively stable homeostasis, a dose of turkey is somehow said to be enough to tip the scales of tryptophan toward hypnotic, dream-laden sleep.

To be sure, tryptophan as a white pill, not a slab of white meat, is used by some as a sleeping aid. Few studies, though, demonstrated efficacy, and the medical dose given is way above what even a total slob would choke down at the Thanksgiving table. But this is only one of the many bits of faulty reasoning in the trypto-myth. One of the clearest debunkings of turkeys-‘n’-sleep, from last year, features the comparative tryptophan content of various foods and points out that cheese and ham pack as much trypto-wallop as the big bland bird.

A more complete list of tryptophan content in food is even on Wikipedia, which notes the dose in everything from dried cod (0.7 grams of tryptophan per 100 grams of food) to soybeans (0.59 grams) and cheddar cheese (0.32 grams). Each is more potent than turkey (0.24 grams); indeed, chicken, beef, and salmon all have about the same amount as turkey, though a nice chicken dinner has never been associated with sleep. Praying for sleep, perhaps, but the right to conk out near the table? No way. For those who need the myth not only scientifically disproved but ground cruelly into the pavement, try the Mythbusters show from this week, “Trypping Out.”

So why do we persist in observing the tryptophan and turkey and sleep version of the Thanksgiving? After all, Thanksgiving is the great American holiday, the perfect Rockwell moment, as American as apple (or the odious pumpkin) pie. Aren’t we strong enough to handle the truth, especially on this the day of gathering together to ask the Lord’s blessing? Probably not—the tryptophan story provides us with the perfect cover for the real reason we so love the holiday.

It’s the parking lot across the street from the church that’s developed its own congregation in the past three weeks—a raggle-taggle group of people from across the city and the country who have worked to get food, cleaning supplies, and clothes to some of the areas neediest residents.

The group is racing to expand its operation—a task easier said than done in neighborhoods where piles of discarded furniture and appliances still litter the streets, cars rendered useless by sea water remain where the water took them, and police officers directing traffic wear construction masks to keep out the dust every passing vehicle kicks up.

Governor Andrew Cuomo Tuesday announced a free temporary subway line, the H, running from Far Rockaway at the eastern end of the peninsula to Beach 90th Street, about halfway down its length. Getting volunteers to some of the hardest hit areas, and transporting supplies to the areas where residents are scrubbing encroaching mold from their walls with donated bleach, remain difficult tasks, volunteers at St. Francis de Sales said, and restoring some mass transportation may help add to their ranks.

That’s exactly why the biggest story at this time last year was how singer Kroeger and his band, Nickelback, fended off an inspired movement to stop the Canadian rock/grunge group—and frequent butt of jokes—from performing at the halftime show of the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers clash.

It wasn’t always like this. Long after the pilgrims made their voyage, Yale and Princeton’s football teams squared off in a Thanksgiving grudge match in 1876. And who can forget the Buffalo Prospects’ 0-0 thriller with the Rochester Jeffersons in 1919’s New York League duel?

When the NFL launched, the Lions quickly turned into regular host of the tradition in the early ’30s. The Dallas Cowboys followed as cohosts in 1966. And in 2006, a third wild-card night game joined.

Since this tradition is more than just plunking down on a couch in a tryptophan-induced haze to watch big men in tight pants vie for the elusive “Turkey Leg ” or “Galloping Gobbler,” the day’s unofficial and seemingly useless most valuable player trophies, here’s a guide to the games.

Caterers, a silent dishwasher, and the kind of fridge you see on The Price Is Right?! The Conner family steps it up for this ninth season Thanksgiving episode after Roseanne wins the lottery, but that doesn’t stop the drama. Roseanne and Jackie’s mother, Bev, is outraged at the idea of a gay couple adopting children and, in the middle of a dinnertime diatribe, accidentally outs her own attraction to women.

Friends: The One With All the Thanksgivings

Drunk Mother

If your mother has one too many glasses of pinot grigio, there’s one topic that’s sure to entice all: the never-ending Petraeus scandal. There’s something in it for everyone: Did his biographer, Paula Broadwell, know classified information? Why did she tell other-other-woman Jill Kelley to back off? And what about Kelley’s 30,000 pages of emails with General Allen? Wait, why do we care again? Poor Holly! This is something you’re going to want to know a lot about, and luckily, there’s a never-ending stream of news stories at your disposal to browse through before you delve into the fallen general’s mess of an affair.

Weird, Argumentative Uncle

Try to avoid him at all costs. He probably wants to talk about nukes. To prep for conversation with him, here’s a little background: with pressure mounting on Iran to cease its nuclear production, the slightest provocation could get everyone talking about their rumored upcoming “one on one” talks with the U.S. Some neutral conversation topics include the upcoming Mayan prediction of the end of the world on Dec. 21, which he probably has his own, um, interesting theories about.

But will it work? Will customers who have long ignored labor leaders’ many attempts to raise awareness about the company’s treatment of workers suddenly break from their bargain-induced frenzy and start caring?

Maybe.

Even the most cynical labor economists tell The Daily Beast that the Walmart protests, which began months ago, are already having the desired effect, though the unions backing those workers are far from reaching their ultimate goal. That effect: media attention. Stories about the strikes have appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times, on National Public Radio, the Huffington Post, and just about every other major media outlet in the U.S., along with several around the world. Workers are getting the attention they crave, the chance to tell the world about what they call unfair labor conditions, and Walmart is getting some bad publicity at the worst possible time.

“We want Walmart to take seriously the concerns being raised,” said Tom Geiger, a spokesman for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union. “The endgame is for workers to have a voice in the workplace.”

That line gave me pause and got me thinking about Trump’s “brand.”

Trump’s brand is consequence-free bullying and chicanery; mean-spirited antics designed to ride a media cycle so he can promote himself or his Macy’s product line at the expense of others. It’s not the kind of thing that you build a fashion business on top of, and it certainly isn’t consistent with my experience as a longtime Macy’s customer. And here was the CEO of Macy’s promising to further develop that brand. I felt compelled to take action. So I started a petition at SignOn.org, which is a free-to-use online organizing platform.

Then the election results came in. Trump took to Twitter and repeatedly called for the overthrow of the American government. His demands for revolt coincided with the launch of Macy’s big Christmas advertising campaign. Trump is featured in the ads playing a skeptic on Kris Kringle’s identity. Macy’s decision to portray Trump in this role raised some eyebrows given that he spent years promoting the racially charged birther conspiracy. The result was that Macy’s relationship with Trump became front and center, and the petition took off.

The petition took off because of the incompatibility between Macy’s brand and Trump’s brand of bigoted bullying.