While Thanksgiving was officially on a Thursday, the Animalia Thanksgiving Exposition started on Wednesday and went through Sunday because of how many people there were, how many activities there were, and especially because of the Bachelor/Bachelorette auction. There was so much fun to be had that there was only time to talk about a few of them right now.
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Because autumn was also considered hunting season, several predator Animalians and their bondmates went hunting in the woods, with uplifted Animalians teaching their converted bondmates how to hunt animals without weapons while their converted bondmates showed them how to get hunting tags so they wouldn't get in trouble with the Game and Parks Commission. While a good number of those hunted were turkeys for the Thursday feast, there were also other animals that would turn up, such as the full grown bull moose that Clara and Rick managed to bag together. While most of it went to make novelty jerky, Rick's parent showed Clara how they make trophies out of their catches, which fascinated Clara.
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Because of how many apples that were gathered, there was a kind of cooking contest involving apples, with a $200 prize for best unique recipe. While there were mainly deserts such as apple pies and turnovers, there were others. Another thing that was done was an official showing of how apple cider was made. One surprising thing that resulted was how ten boxes of apples could make over thirty gallons of apple cider.
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The Bachelor/Bachelorette Auction was very surprising to many visitors, mainly because of how many Animalians were registered single. More often than not, those who managed to score a date with an Animalian were those who wouldn't have had luck with human dates due to inexperience, unappealing-ness, or misinterpretation due to spending too much time on pornographic websites or R-rated movies.
One of the more humorous results of it was how the word "spud", aside from being a synonym for potato, would also come to mean "the polar opposite of a stud". This definition resulted from guys (or girls, sometimes) making moves on Animalians that already had bondmates. One fine example was how a college jock that fit the label of "douchebro" decided to make some moves on Heather, gets intimidated into submission by Jeremy (who had finally taken the plunge and became a male Syntixisaurus Rex for Heather), and gets picked up for a date by Tyra. When the video of it appeared on the Animalia Website, it would generate more than a million views, eventually make it's way to AFV, and get all three of them the $100,000 prize.
There was no doubt that the Dinotopians, especially the males, were the most popular of all the "singles" at the auction. These would often generate bids on just one of them going into the tens of millions. This alone would get enough money to help hurricane victims rebuild, and help Catholic Charities aid those in third world countries get food, clean water, and safe housing.
While most of the auction's "goods" would have their important "bits" covered, they would showcase both their strength, their sculpted definition of their musculatures, and their talents. One of the biggest news stories that would result from this was how Jill managed to score a rich man from Louisiana as permanent bondmate material, when originally she would have no luck because she was an alligator Animalian.
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There were other opportunities for newsgroups to interview members of Animalia society over things that were puzzling to other members of society:
"Why would there be co-ed showers at both Claw Coliseum and WSA, with those showers only available to high school students?" asked one reporter from CNN.
"It has to do with some things that happened when I was both in high school, and teaching high school." replied Eliza, "When I was in high school, it was no secret that the captain of the football team was enjoying the company of the cheerleading squad, to put it mildly, and a few of those girls ended up with children and were unable to finish high school. And when I started teaching, at least one girl ended up with a baby a year, so to speak."
"I see." said the Reporter, glad that Eliza managed to answer his questions tactfully, especially with the criticism that Animalia made once about ads for sexual products during times when children would be present.
"We've also gotten an offer from Trojan about new products for us." Said Eliza, "For example, they're taking their Ecstasy product and making it with new extra-stretchy material and calling it Trojan X-Prime."
"Really." answered the Reporter, glad at them keeping it somewhat clean.
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After the event, the money from the Bachelor/Bachelorette auction alone, not counting the silent auction, was summed up to be a little over $12 billion dollars, which was more than enough to help aid hurricane victims and still give half to Catholic Charities for aiding those in impoverished Latin American countries, and aid in future projects at Horizon Labs. Also, everyone had so much fun that there was a request for a similar auction for Valentine's Day.