It’s the time of year when:
- it’s dark when you leave for work. . . and when you get out of work
- your Halloween pumpkins are rotting memories that no one is willing to touch long enough to throw out, and
- holiday music is a non-stop fixture whenever you venture out of the house
In other words, Thanksgiving!
Thanksgiving safety
Like everyone else, we love Thanksgiving and its focus on food, family, and friends. But there are few things that can turn a family gathering sour more quickly than an impromptu trip to the emergency room. Here is a quick list of Thanksgiving safety tips to help you make sure your holiday is more full of fun – and less full of insurance copays:
Turkey frying 101
We could write a book about this – but somebody already has. And we could go on and on about all the safety tips such as:
- Don’t overfill your fryer with oil
- Leave a safe distance between the turkey fryer and your house, car, trees, or anything else you don’t want to catch fire
- Keep kids and pets away from the fryer
- Don’t leave your fryer unattended
- Use heavy duty oven mitts to protect your hands
- Have a grease-rated fire extinguisher nearby just in case
but, let’s face it, the number 1 tip is:
Thaw your turkey before you fry it.
Your turkey needs to be unfrozen and dry before you lower it into the fryer. Introducing a frozen turkey to hot oil is an almost surefire way to have a Thanksgiving get together end with a call to your insurance agent about how you burned down your neighbor’s garage. Or worse. Way worse.
Last one in is a rotten egg!
Safety-proof for guests
The holidays are a time for good cheer and family, which means extended families, visiting friends, and basically having folks drop by your house to eat your food and then overstay their welcome dozing on your couch for the next few hours. When you are entertaining guests, it’s smart to keep in mind their safety needs. For example, if you have guests who are toddlers, it’s smart to cover outlets, put door locks on rooms you want to be off-limits, and move breakables off low tables. Ditto for if your guests are bringing four-legged friends – the dish of harvest-mix M&Ms should be placed high enough where Fido can’t make himself sick (plus, it means you don’t have to share with the shorties😊.)
Put away the food after putting away the food
While the temptation is to eat the Thanksgiving feast and leave the food out for people to help themselves, try to resist. It’s recommended that your leftover turkey be sliced, divided, put into airtight containers, and placed into the fridge within two hours. If you are the type who eats then goes into a small coma for the rest of the day only to awake when the evening NFL game starts, you may want to name a designated divider to promptly portion out and refrigerate the leftovers.
The day after (and the day after that)
No matter what your Aunt Jackie may have told you, Thanksgiving leftovers do indeed have an expiration date. The US Department of Health & Human Services recommends you eat or freeze your leftovers in 3 to 4 days. This gives you until Sunday, Monday at the latest, to reheat or freeze the extra turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, or whatever else you want to save from the feast. The only exception is fruitcake, which is inedible from the first moment it is created (summoned?), and should be immediately thrown away. And helpful note: the 3-day leftovers rule isn’t just for Thanksgiving safety, but all year ’round.
Just say no.
As a close, we wanted to say a quick thank you to all our customers, friends, colleagues, and partners, and wish everyone a wonderful, happy, and SAFE holiday!
Interested in improving your workplace safety efforts, reducing accidents, and even lowering your insurance premiums? Fulcrum can help with all this and more; sign up for a free trial to give Fulcrum a test drive!