What I’m Thankful For

What I’m Thankful For

Ok, so Thanksgiving lists of what we are grateful for are overdone and preposterously self-promoting.  No one wants to read the list of family, friends and colleagues that I am truly blessed to have in my life.  No one wants to read that shit.  So let me instead give you a slightly more humorous, slightly more insightful list of what I am thankful for at the start of our holiday season.

I am grateful that my children do not yet listen to Justin Beiber.  Yes, I know they probably will at some point and that I am only postponing the inevitable, but I just don’t want to explain to two young admiring doters why that punk is a pompous douchebag.  Because you know I probably would.

I am thankful that Donald Trump has no serious chance of becoming president.  Sure, he’s been shaking things up, and I appreciate that, but while his racial and gender insensitivity may play well when polls are limited to the old white men of the Republican constituency, that crap ain’t gonna fly in a general election where Hispanics and women actually vote.  His concession speech, whenever that glorious moment comes, will bring me such sweet joy, much like what the Donald feels when he fires someone.

I am grateful for black tar heroin.  Not because I take it.  No, I just like to say it, because, you know, black tar heroin is always funny.

I am personally indebted to George Clooney.  That suave bastard made salt and pepper “distinguished”.  Thank you, George Clooney.  Thank you.

I am grateful for my phone’s calendar function.  I am fairly certain that I would be utterly useless without it.

I am grateful for the the new Star Wars movie coming out in December.  Under the promising new direction of JJ Abrams, I am excited to see a Star Wars film in the theater with my son for the first time.  Even more so, I am just plain giddy that the new films will not feature Jar Jar Binks or Hayden Christensen.  In fact, I am simply pleased for the demise of  Hayden Christensen’s acting career in general.

I am thankful for alcohol.  It makes my family bearable.

I am grateful for football.  Something needs to distract us from the onslaught of catastrophic world events that dominates the media headlines.  And then football had to make it’s own way into the national headlines with a tragic avoidance of concussion issues and violence against women.  Oh where have you gone, OJ Simpson?  Oh that’s right: prison….

I’m thankful for Bernie Sanders.  Yes, I met him personally years ago and loved his quirky and passionate demeanor, but in this context, I am simply grateful for that crazy, old man, get-off-my-lawn look that comes over him when he gets really impassioned about something.  Something like a bird’s nest thrown asunder by the winds of a Nor’Easter.

I am grateful for the recent Supreme Court decision permitting gay marriage.  It’s about time gay couples were allowed to be miserable like the rest of us.

I am grateful for overly pious, sanctimonious assholes who judge others without holding themselves accountable for the very activities they condemn in others, like Ted Haggard the evangelical preacher of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs who spilled out vitriol against the gay community but paid male escorts for sex.  Somebody has to make the rest of us look better by contrast.

I am thankful to the movie 40-year Old Virgin for teaching me terms such as rusty trombone, Cleveland steamer, donkey punch, and Kentucky bow tie.  Don’t look those terms up.  Just don’t.

I am grateful for indoor plumbing.  No one wants to freeze their ass off literally.

And finally, I am grateful for the enlightened teachings of the Dalai Lama.  Sometimes I think they are the  only thing that keep me from losing my everlasting mind when I see some of the stupid ass shit people do.