Holidays can be a great reminder of what you have. A couple of New Years ago my family and I all drank Martinelli’s and sang Auld Old Lang Syne. Then when I kept singing after midnight my sister threatened to hit me. I was genuinely moved by this. But the holidays can also be stressful. Just watch one of the gazillions of movies about estranged Dads trying to connect with their kids on Christmas. Or ask whoever does the cooking on Thanksgiving.

For the past few years my family has kept Thanksgiving simple. My freshman year we had tacos. Sophomore year it was pizza. Last year we went to a friend’s house, so someone else was cooking. And this year we went back to tacos. This was a good thing because by the time my family was ready to make dinner I was ready to eat the table. And when I’m that hungry I start to mutter under my breath a lot and the situation deteriorates from there.

But the tacos were delicious and easy to make. I think it took about half an hour. We ate on the couch in front of the movie Hot Fuzz. It was about a cop having a shootout with the village benefit society which, as it turns out, is actually kind of a cult. Nothing says Thanksgiving like hearing a bunch of people in medieval-ish robes murmur “the greater good” in perfect unison.

That Thanksgiving we watched a total of three movies. We saw the second part of Mockingjay, Hot Fuzz, and Coherence. Mockingjay was depressing, lots of explosions and dead kids. Hot Fuzz was hilarious. And Coherence blew my mind. It was about people meeting versions of themselves from different realities. I ended up really confused but I did get to learn my family’s strategies for what to do if this happened. My mom would hop in her car and not stop driving till it was over. My sister would just stay in whatever reality she ended up in. As for me, I’m not sure what I would do but it would probably involve swearing. And possibly tacos.