It’s the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, which means lots of travel and lots of family time. It’s a double-edged sword: it’s always nice to see family, for a time. But when you’re sleeping in your old bedroom for a few nights, waking up to and going to sleep after spending the day with the family with few opportunities to take a breather, things can get tense. Here, allow me to give you some things to do when you need a break from all of the forced family fun of Thanksgiving.
TV
Late Night
-The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are both in reruns this week.
-Conan is new with Eva Mendes, Bob Saget, and Neon Trees tonight and new tomorrow night with Jim Parsons, Marisa Miller, and Brendon Walsh.
-Fallon is new tonight with Colin Firth, Terrell Owens, Chad Ochocinco, and N.E.R.D. and new tomorrow night with Bill Hader, Victoria Justice, and James Otto & Ronnie Milsap.
-Letterman is new tonight with Staff Sgt. Salvatore Giunta and Sahara Smith before going into reruns tomorrow and Friday.
-Kimmel is new tonight with Paris Hilton, Dave Salmoni, and Metric tonight before going into reruns tomorrow and Friday.
Special Airings
-TBS is running a nine-hour Seinfeld marathon on Friday, starting at 11am with “The Contest” and ending with 7:30pm with “The Strike,” the Festivus episode. It’s basically like a best-of DVD, running in order.
-Fox is showing The Simpsons Movie on Thanksgiving at 8pm. In addition, they’re showing a preview of H. Jon Benjamin and Eugene Mirman’s new animated show Bob’s Burgers during that broadcast, whatever that means. It is probably just an extended commercial of some sort.
-Comedy Central is running the Roast of David Hasselhoff at 10pm tomorrow and the Roast of Pam Anderson at 11:30pm.
Internet
-Netflix just added a few more past seasons of SNL to Watch Instantly, allowing you to relive some of the worst years in the show’s history: the early 80s.
-Also new to Netflix streaming this week: standup documentary I Am Comic, 48 Hrs. and Moonstruck.
-There have been a bunch of great web series out lately, so now is a great time to go back and catch up. Some of the better ones include Vag Magazine, Broad City, Full Benefits, Very Mary Kate, and Backwash.
-You can also go through every web video posted to this here site, which is a pretty nice selection if I do say so myself, by checking out the web videos tag right here.
Books
If you escape to a bookstore, there have been some great comedy-related books out recently. Here are some to look out for:
-Bill Carter’s The War for Late Night
-Mike Birbiglia’s Sleepwalk With Me
-The Pleasure Syndicate’s Our Bodies, Our Junk
-Kristen Schaal and Rich Blomquists’s The Sexy Book of Sexy Sex
-Amy Sedaris’ Simple Times: Crafts for Poor People
-Judd Apatow’s I Found This Funny
Got more suggestions or info on stuff that is nice and distracting for this long weekend? Email ‘em to me or leave ‘em in the comments and I will update this post accordingly.
