Any man with a microphone can tell you what he loves the most

So, it's Thanksgiving. I hope your holiday is a good one.

I remember having to always talk about things I was thankful for around Thanksgiving. I could never come up with anything. Not because I wasn't thankful for things, but because the things I was thankful for -- my family, my friends -- were so obvious I didn't think it needed to be said.

But sometimes, I guess it does.

I'm thankful for my family. With a few notable exceptions.

I'm thankful for my jobs. Even though I hate -- no, despise -- no, loathe one of them, and the other is (shh, don't tell them) very temporary. I am thankful to finally have a way of pulling in enough money to pay my bills.

I'm thankful for Defiant, my iPod. (Yes, I named it. Not because I wanted to, but because iTunes made me. No, it did.)

I'm thankful for DVDs. I've been watching Firefly all day, a beautitful activity not possible (or at least not convenient) in the days of VHS.

I'm thankful for Wikipedia. Best way to ever kill four hours: wander around the site, hopping from article to article with no plan in mind. Today, I read about hypnosis, Uri Geller, McDonald's, and the Smashing Pumpkins.

I'm thankful for the naive people who continue to allow me (knowingly or otherwise) to use their free internet access.

I'm thankful for the fact that, at least right now, my car is running.

I'm thankful for our Hunter game, even though the last episode really blew and it was all my fault. (I haven't written the recap yet; not because I've been busy, but because the last episode really blew and it was all my fault. But I will.)

I'm thankful for my Vampire game, which has gone on so friggin' long now (just over two years) that the characters all feel like real people. I know Benjamin, Alice, Alice's grandmother, Ashely, Dave, Sahra, Virginia, Poe, little Benjamin, Katherine, Zachary, Jacob, Sandra, Irene, Eric, Eleanor, Duncan, Tara, Night and Darrell better than I know most actual humans. Or would want to, tell you the truth. Bad things are going to happen to several of those characters (especially poor Poe), and I don't want them to. It makes me sad.

I'm thankful my upstairs neighbors haven't vaccuumed yet today. But they will. Oh yes, they will. They started before I finished writing. Bastards.

I'm thankful for the fact that I live in a country where I can't be put in jail for calling President Bush an idiot with his empty, peanut head lodged directly between his buttcheeks. I mean, as long as the Treasury Department doesn't read this. You won't tell them, will you?

I'm thankful for my PlayStation 2. Well, actually, Stephen's PlayStation 2. Mine is sitting unused in the corner. Oh, hell, I'm thankful for mine, too.

But most of all, I'm thankful for you. Yeah, you, the person reading this. I'm thankful for my friends. Yes, I seem to have surrounded myself with a group of people who will sleep through planned activities, or forget about them, or show up two hours late for them with frightening regularity...but I don't know what I'd do without you people.

(Yes, I do, actually. I would've thrown myself off a tall building years ago.)

(I could find a tall building.)

(Obviously, there are none in Dickinson, I know. But I could go somewhere else. And I would have.)

So, as a way of saying thanks to my friends, who are probably creeped out by my sappiness right now, I'm going to give you the best gift I could offer: I'm not going to make you read more of my dreck. I was planning on rewriting my favorite music videos list, the one I did about a year ago, but instead, I just went on YouTube, found the videos, and compiled them here for you. After all, no need for me to tell you why they're great when you can just watch them yourself. Here's the list, though:

1. "Everybody Hurts," R.E.M.
2. "Sledgehammer," Peter Gabriel
3. "Sabotage," Beastie Boys
4. "Criminal," Fiona Apple
5. "Just," Radiohead
6. "Hurt," Johnny Cash
7. "Welcome to the Jungle," Guns N' Roses
8. "Prison Sex," Tool
9. "Billie Jean," Michael Jackson
10. "Jeremy (unedited)," Pearl Jam
11. "The Hardest Button to Button," The White Stripes
12. "Big Me," Foo Fighters
13. "Short Skirt/Long Jacket," Cake
14. "In Bloom," Nirvana
15. "It's Oh So Quiet," Bjork

Watch them if you like.

But seriously, you guys: thanks.





(And if you recognized the lyric in this post's title, score yourself 50 Cool Points. And the first player in my Hunter game to recognize it and tell me about it gets 5 free XP. 'Cause I'm generous like that.)