Joey had reasons. They were threefold.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, which is my favorite holiday, YES EVEN MORE FAVORITE THAN CHRISTMAS. Thanksgiving is an excuse for sloth and gluttony, which are two of my favorite vices, and, yeah, you can eat a lot and sleep a lot on Christmas but there's so much PRESSURE at Christmastime. You have to buy the right gifts and make sure you spend time with all of your friends and family, and there's usually some work-related holiday function you have to attend and when, WHEN I ASK YOU, is the free time at Christmas? There's no such thing.

Not Thanksgiving, though. Sure, you might have to make several stops on your Thanksgiving journey, but there's delicious food at all of them. It's what the Pilgrims always dreamed of. I think. Right? Wasn't that was the point of the first Thanksgiving? Eating and drinking a lot? And being really smelly?

And so, in honor of America's laziest holiday, I present...A LIST. My top five Thanksgivings, in no particular order:

1. The Shrinking Table

Back when I was in high school, I think, we went to Thanksgiving at my Grandma's, because TRADITION. My cousins were all very wee and I spent most of my time chasing them around my Grandma's house until one or all of us got tired. In a brief moment of rest, I was sitting at a large folding table with my dad when my cousin Josh, then four or so, came in. He walked out of the room, and I don't know how this came about, but my dad and I decided to fold up the table we were sitting at and set up a slightly smaller one. When Josh came back in, he was amazed! The table had shrunk! What sorcery was this?!

He left again, we folded up that table, and replaced it with a slightly smaller one. Josh came back in and was all, "wtf," but, you know, in four-year-old-speak, and I told him Casper had come in and was sprinkling shrinking powder on everything. Which maybe traumatized him for life but we're not sure yet. Josh left again, we replaced that table with a TV tray, Josh came in and saw it, left to look for Casper, and when he came back in, we'd put the TV tray away and told Josh that the table finally got so small that we couldn't see it anymore. It was awesome.

Also, I just remembered that this might have also happened on Christmas, not Thanksgiving. THIS LIST IS RUINED ALREADY.

2. The First Thanksgiving (with Joe)

I'm not talking about actual Thanksgiving, when our schedule was thus: I went to my family's Thanksgiving, he went to his family's, I went over to his family's for dessert, we both went back to MY family's for dessert...I mean, wtf, that is crazy, which is why now we alternate Thanksgiving holidays with our families. Last year, we spent Thanksgiving with my family, this year we spend it with his family, and so on and so on forever and ever.

I'm talking about the next day, when we consolidated all of the Thanksgiving leftovers our parents had given us, with a trip to the grocery store for extra mashed potatoes (probably), and rewarmed everything so we could eat another Thanksgiving dinner, in our pajamas, while watching It's Always Sunny or some other such nonsense. Perfect day, yes?

3. The Turkey Trot

Back in 2007, Heidi and I decided that the best way to start our Thanksgiving would obviously be to run five miles, because then there would be zero guilt about the 50 pounds of mashed potatoes we planned on eating later in the day. We "trained" for it and were at the starting line at 8am that frigid, rainy morning and, though we felt like dying several times during the race, we finished it. I wanted to wear my number for the rest of the day but eventually showered so I could spend Thanksgiving with my family, drinking wine and playing games and talking about my upcoming trip to DC because that was also the same year as:

4. Collective Thanksgiving!

This was not the first time I'd ever met anyone IRL after getting to know them online, and it wasn't the last time, but it was the most memorable. I don't even remember how exactly The Collective as a group came to be. Kat and I had been reading each other's blogs for quite a while, and I vaguely remember somehow stumbling across Heather Anne and Abigail's blogs, but I don't remember when we all stopped being Heather Anne and Kat and Abigail and Jennie and instead became a complete set.

I also can't remember whose idea it was to get together for Thanksgiving, but that person is a genius. I got up in the wee small hours of the morning on Black Friday, but it wasn't to go shopping, it was to drive to DC and meet some of the best people I've ever had the honor of knowing. There was something magical about that trip. We got to skip the "getting to know you" portion of IRL friendships because we already knew each other. We knew each other for years without ever having met. But, you know, I'm so glad we finally did meet, obviously. I mean, otherwise I would have missed Abigail and Heather Anne's version of the OK Go treadmill dance, and who other than Kat would ever make me a balloon animal and then tie it to a firecracker? THEY ARE THE GREETEST.

5. The One With Chandler in a Box

Yeah, I know I wasn't technically AT this Thanksgiving celebration but I watched it on TV and isn't that almost the same thing? YES.

start today tomorrow

Today I have:

spilled (hot) coffee on myself

stepped in (goose) poop

been accused of being a guy for not providing Tamara with enough date-details (sorry, Tam)

finished the Internet

broken my umbrella

written my Collective post AHEAD OF SCHEDULE

listened to the Vampire Weekend album approximately 5 times

And now time seems to have stopped, so I'm trying to resist the urge to crawl under my desk and take a nap.

how many ADD kids does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

You guys, my ADD (I don't have ADD) is out of control today. This morning, I forgot if I'd conditioned my hair, I stepped on Phoebe approximately 50 times while I wandered around my room wondering what I was doing, and I put my shirt on backwards. Twice.

Hey! So this week on The Collective, we're interviewing fictional characters. Yesterday, Heather Anne interviewed Neville Longbottom (awesome), today . . . I don't know, because Abigail hasn't posted yet, tomorrow I don't know either, but I suspect I know who Kat's interviewing and Thursday? Um, I have no idea. I've run about a zillion fictional characters through my head and none have really stuck. So, who do you guys think I should interview? Just tell me who to do (that's what she said) so I don't have to think anymore.

Help me, Internets, you're my only hope.

the world has turned and left me here

When I woke up this morning, my old friend Figment was sitting on the sofa. He was chomping on a bowl of Cheerios (bowl and all) and holding this picture:



I walked back into my bedroom, pinched myself to make sure it hurt, and went back to the living room. Figment was still there.

"Jennie," he said. "This picture you drew of me hardly does me justice."

"Sorry, I'm not much of an artist," I said.

"And I read your blog. Well, some of it. Then I got bored and went to TWoP," he confessed.

"Awesome."

"When did you start spelling your name with an "ie" at the end?" he asked.

"Fourth grade?"

"Why?"

"Because there were fifteen other Jennys in my class and I wanted to be different," I answered.

"Fifteen, huh? I see you haven't stopped exaggerating," he placed his cereal bowl (the half that was left) on the ottoman, where it leaked milk all over the fabric. I started to object, but then I remembered that time Phoebe threw up on the ottoman and decided milk couldn't really hurt it.

"So, Figment," I began. "Whatcha doing here?"

"Well, Jenny," I don't know how he managed to pronounce my name with a Y, but he did it. "I've got the old Rocketship (duh) outside and wondered if you wanted to go somewhere."

"But I have to go to work," I said.

"Why?"

"For . . . money."

"Why?"

"Um. For stuff?"

"Stuff? Where we're going we don't need stuff," he exclaimed, jumping up and knocking the ottoman, along with the half-bowl, over. Great, I thought. Now there's milk all over the carpet. Then I remembered that time Phoebe threw up on the carpet and decided milk couldn't really hurt it.

"OK," I said. "Let me call into work and we can go."

"Great. We'll just have to pack some stuff first," he said.

"But you said we wouldn't need stuff!"

"That was just for dramatic effect," he said, waving his hand at me. He lumbered to my room, pulled out a suitcase, and started throwing my clothes inside.

"Can you at least fold that?" I asked.

"Geez, when did you get so uptight?"

"Bite me," I said. "Where are we going anyway?"

"Um, it's a Rocketship (duh). We're going to space. The final frontier."

"Still a Star Trek fan, I see."

"Well, it's really the only show I can get in my Dragon Lair," he said.

"I see. If we're going to space, don't forget my ET shirt."

"Already packed," he said and slammed the suitcase closed. "Let's go."

"Can I pee first?" I asked.

"No time," he said.

"But--"

"Calm down, there's a bathroom on the Rocketship. Duh."

pssssst!

I'm over here.

On the bed, on the floor, on a towel by the door, in the tub, in the car, up against the mini-bar

This morning, the DJ on my favorite radio station in the history of radio stations was plugging something called PrinceFest, which is taking place next month and consists of local bands covering nothing but Prince songs. As soon as I got to work, I checked it out online and emailed Heidi because WE HAVE TO GO TO THIS. HELLO. How awesome and hilarious is this going to be? The truth is, I can't even tell you BECAUSE I HAVEN'T BEEN YET.

Anyway. What else. Hmm. Last night at volunteering, I got to play Candy Land. And then we played in this mini sandbox. It was amazing. The weird thing about volunteering is, I'm usually in a horrible mood when I get there (as I've just come from work), but by the time I leave I'm in such a good mood you'd think I just won the lottery and married Jake Gyllenhaal or something. You wouldn't think that after talking about death and grieving for an hour and a half would lead to a good mood, but YOU'D BE WRONG.

Also, I forgot to link to all this stuff. Because I'm easily distracted. So, here's the deal. This week on The Collective, we're listing the 5 Best Somethings. On Monday, Heather Anne told us about the 5 Best TV Couples on . . . TV. In it, she compares Jim Halpert to Mr. Darcy and then my brain stopped working. And Abigail, well, she gave everyone 5 excuses to drink. I don't know how to thank her. But if you read it, you'll see that you should be drinking right now. Today, Kat loves on bugs. Some of them I'm OK with, like fireflies, but then she started talking about zombie-making wasps and I might have passed out a little. I'd link to my post, but it doesn't go up until tomorrow. Also, I haven't written it. Also, I don't even know what I'm writing about. Clearly my procrastination is in FULL EFFECT.

nothing to see here

Today on The Collective, I use the Internets to scar my parents (some more).

Whatever. This is worth it:

thursday, I don't care about you*

Guess what, Internets? This one time? I met these people. Named Kat and Abigail and Heather. And they were fun and hilarious and much, much smarter than me and one of them had a GREAT IDEA yadda yadda yadda, we decided to create this new blog. Where we talk about . . . stuff . . . and tell you what we think about the . . . stuff. And it's going to be magic. I can tell.

So. Go read it. There are already FOUR POSTS and there will be FOUR POSTS every week and my day is Thursday so don't expect to see much here on Thursday on account of I will have already written something over there. The end ok bye.

*lies

Bubbles

"It needs more soap."

"It seems OK to me."

"You're not supposed to eat that stuff, you know."

"How else are you supposed to know when it's ready? Besides, I'm not eating it, I'm taste-testing."

"What does it taste like?"

"Duh, like bathtime."

"Oh."

"My bubbles are gonna float all the way to heaven!"

"How far away is that?"

"About as far as Cleveland."

"Wow."

"I know."