As an avid user of take-out menus, delivery and the occasional fancy sit-down restaurant, Thanksgiving is a time of year when I feel most, well, inadequate. My mom always puts together a very classy, tasty Thanksgiving meal — from the delicious turkey to the polished silverware. And with my sister attending the French Culinary Institute in New York City, I don’t feel involved in the holiday operations until it comes time to eat. Because I happen to love my dogs and am very good at cleaning, I have somehow acquired the tasks of dog walker, dog washer and dishwasher. I’m okay with this — because I have done the math! The average Thanksgiving dinner, including wine, appetizers and desserts (I like to sample each pie), contains about 3,500 calories, roughly. It also happens that manning all the holiday chores that no one wants to take on burns the most calories! Because the dogs have to be washed before guests arrive, I consider this my “pre-workout,” when I get my metabolism prepared for continuous servings of turkey, stuffing and green bean casserole. Bathing a dog for 15 minutes burns about 56 calories. Luckily, I have two dogs, amounting to 112 calories. Walking the dogs is a must. They get very excited when guests arrive, so a hardy walk before dinner is necessary to tire them out, and one after dinner rewards them for being good. Walking two dogs for 40 minutes burns about 200 calories. Doing this twice doubles my score to  400 calories burned. Finally, the dishes. Eleven guests, a three-course meal, wine glasses, coffee mugs and silverware equates to a lot of washing. Thirty minutes of dishwashing burns about 74 calories. For those of you in charge of chatting up Grandpa, I suggest standing while you listen to his stories. Standing and socializing for one hour burns about 120 calories. Taking out the trash only burns five calories, so I wouldn’t jump the gun on that one. So, my Thanksgiving workout burns 706 calories. Although I haven’t considered the calories my mom and sister will burn while preparing an entire Thanksgiving dinner, I am quite confident I will be ahead in the calorie-burning game — and well on my way to fitting into that Christmas cocktail dress! — Courtney Centeno, account executive Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours from the staff of Global Traveler!