One way to avoid a decision on what to do for Thanksgiving, a basically food-oriented holiday, is to become completely incapable of eating. That's what my body did, throat swelling up to the point where I can barely talk or swallow. Our CEO has declared today to be a paid day off, and yesterday was one too, so it only makes sense that I get immobilizingly sick. I can't even sit around the house eating leftover turkey from someone else's festivities, I can only lie, face down (so I don't choke on my own saliva, which I can't swallow) in bed thinking about the greeks (I'm reading Plato) and how they treated Man-Boy love as a sort of regrettable bad habit, like smoking. The stress of not being able to swallow is giving me a tension headache, too, in addition to the standard "sleeping too much" headache I'm developing.

Some might say Thanksgiving is a gratitude-oriented holiday. Realistically, does anyone look forward with anticipation to being really, really thankful for all the great things in life? No, the thing everyone won't shut up about is food, and how much of it they're going to eat.

I had actually planned to spend the holiday with Kris, drinking in a bar and trying to be as unpleasant as possible, but instead I was smacked down by the gods of contagion. Gods of contagion!! Why hast thou forsaken me! You guys used to be on my side. Hmmm. Maybe contagion is still on my side. Maybe it is very important that I remain at home, not eating anything and getting my pillowcase all gross. I am pretty hungry, perhaps it's time for another glass of tepid water.

Let's see, what sort of things am I Thankful(tm) for right now?

• I live in a really cool era of technological innovation and relative open-mindedness (all gizmos are covered by this, especially circumaural headphones and the technologies supporting them)
• My maternal Grandmother somehow made it to Hawaii so I don't have to live in China.
• There's lots of different kinds of music
• I'm in really good health(sm), except for that throat thing.
• I have Really Good Friends, still, which are fucking impossible to find.
• Bacon (to a lesser degree than the friends thing)

Hmm. Maybe it should be named "Gloatsgiving". Who are we thanking, these days? In more credulous times, it was always the Lord. Even the most apostate of families, it seemed, would muster grace before stuffing themselves unconscious, even a decade ago. Recent graces I had observed seemed flippant or insincere at best, and nonexistant usually. So if not God, are we thanking each other? Fate? The entire chain of causation? Turkeys??? BACON?! Damn, I wish I could eat.