On Nov. 22, 2012, I expect to be ...

Option 5: Doing work to cover for everyone feasting.
And option 6: Having a mostly uneventful and ordinary day.

Reason: I am not from the USA but I have US-based colleagues. So I'll be doing their work as well during my ordinary day.

We are at about 30% [slashdot.org], actually.

Deep fried butter is a staple at many of the US state fairs.
The trick is to take a frozen stick of butter.

As for bacon, you need to pre-fry it before you batter it. Cut a stick of wood just slightly bigger a stick of butter, wrap the bacon around it, and fry it (including three tilts).
Then slide out the wooden stick, slide in a frozen butter stick, dip it in batter, flour and batter again, and deep fry it.
Let it cool slightly, then serve it Nyotaimori style.

Not really. Like most American holidays (e.g. Labor Day, Presidents Day, MLK Day, Memorial Day, etc.), Thanksgiving has lost most meaning beyond an excuse to get together with family and eat a bunch of good food.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. The original meaning has to do with some colonists who were rescued by some of the natives. This being a country of immigrants, most families' histories have about as much to do with the original Thanksgiving as they do with Yom Kippur. If it weren't for the traditional big meal with the family, I suspect Thanksgiving would join May Day on the list of holidays Americans no longer give a shit about.

You're pretty much describing Christmas Day here in the UK. Very little overt religious sentiment, just back to the original solstice celebration.

I am curious though. When did the US start celebrating "Happy Holidays"? It's meaningless. European levels of Christianity are far lower than the US, but we've no problems calling it by its proper name, even though most (including myself) would never worship in a church from one year to another,