The Friday after Thanksgiving, the day that America shops. Students that hail from small liberal arts colleges like Bard have little need for purchasing marked-down trinkets and gym memberships. Instead, the majority of Bard students gather in New York, and observe one another in their natural habitats.

At a party hosted by a friend (we'll call her Saint Dee) at her penthouse apartment, there was Adrian. She leaned against a large silver sculpture and, manifesting a somewhat accidental Southern accent, asked me if "this was what private school parties were like."

I said that I thought so. Adrian and I went to the same public high school, recently compared (in light of the various scandals associated with the report cards given out by the city to public high schools) by none-other-than Bard president Leon Botstein himself, to a vegetarian restaurant that doesn't serve the meat the Department of Education is looking for. Keep yours eyes on the New York Times for new and improved metaphors from He-Who-Shall-Be-Named-Repeatedly-As-Often-As-Possible.

Anyway, the apartment, by no means anything less than gorgeous, was packed with kids from, as Saint Dee put it, "around the world." They were all equipped with brand new wine glasses, the labels of which Saint Dee's mother was graciously removing from the glasses as she wandered about.

The mother, who said of herself that she was "supposed to be locked in my room, not talking to anyone," also told us that she had "dreamed of going to Bard" and so she was "overjoyed" that her daughter was able to attend such a wonderful college where we would be "meeting the most amazing people you'll meet in your entire lives."

She then inspected a nearby kid's joint-rolling skills, gave him a few pointers, and said goodnight.

Paul, decidedly lost on the East Coast, exclaimed that he wanted "a mother just like that" which prompted many people around us to agree vehemently.

Praising Bard College was a theme for the night, I realized, while outside talking to a sophomore I had never seen before (a rare occurrence in such a small community, probably caused by the fact that she was barely tall enough to reach the counter). She told me that Bard was "paradise" and "the only good place left on earth, or at least in America."

"New York," she said, "is a wasteland. New York is dead. It's over, New York is over, and all that's left is Bard."

"Can I write about you in my column?" I asked, thirsting for material. "I write a column for Gawk—"

She held up her hand to my face. Her wineglass shivered a little in her other hand. She closed her eyes and exhaled. Then she opened them again, stepped back and shoved my shoulder.

"NARC!" she screamed. "It's you! You're the NARC! I've been looking for you!"

I laughed.

"You're the one who's been reporting on us! Why—Why would you do that?"

"Wait," I interrupted her. "You're kidding, right? You read Gawker?"

"Of course I read Gawker, I'm from the city, what the fuck else would I read?" she responded and then whipped out her phone.

She insisted on taking my number, telling me that she wanted to "remember me" and that we would "discuss this later." The event prompted some discussion between me and my friend, CC Mellows, who had seen the whole thing.

"What would my pseudonym be?" she asked.

"I don't know, what do you want it to be?"

"CC Mellows! Oh, but don't be mean if you write about me!" she said.

"No, no, never, of course not... What would I say, that you don't smoke pot, that you're British, that you smoke Capri's...."

"Well, that's fine," she said. "But you know those people on Gawker, not matter what you say, they'll be like 'CC MELLOWS IS A CUNT!'"

Another girl I spoke to about being depicted in the column, an Australian (Saint Dee clearly wasn't kidding when she said "kids from all around the world") told me I could put her in the column, but added: "Don't be too harsh."

"I wouldn't dream of it!" I tried to reassure her.

"Oh, but don't worry," she said. "You can be a little mean, just not too much, I mean, I used to write for 'Vice Australia,' so I know how to spell cynicism!"

And so it seems that Bard students are little bit more on edge when they arrive back in the city. The next night a group of us partied at the apartment of a friend. The girl lived in New Jersey, but the apartment, in Battery Park City, was a place her parents owned for weekend trips into the city.

It didn't take long for one of us to discover a cabinet with buckets of porn, the majority of which featured a character named "Big Omar."

After someone let the gerbil they had found in a parking lot with half a tail out of its portable cage, and we wandered over to Bowling Green to find a cell phone-less friend, we began to discuss the return trips plans for Sunday.

"If you guys come to Jersey with me in the afternoon, I'll drive you home," GG Trance offered to me and Lips.

"What are we going to do in Jersey?"

"Go to an All-You-Can-Eat Mongolian Grill and then drive really fast over speed bumps near the L'Oreal factory."

There was silence. Adrian twirled her hair with one hand and fixed her tights with the other. She looked around, giggled a little, and then smiled.

"I miss Bard," she said.

Previously: The Day David Bowie Died

So anyways, William Eville's empty life began to turn around because "sometimes around midnight my friends and I would walk down to Duane Street and, like archaeologists on a dig, peer through the windows of my car to see what he was doing." Then, as often happens in such Rent-era fairy tales, Giuliani Time intervened, and the cops got to the homeless dude anyway. Reclaiming his car—here's guessing Saab hatchback—Mr. Eville noted "the place smelled like an animal's den."

The vagabond was never heard from again, but like a vehicular Bagger Vance, his work was done. The unwritten epilogue to William Eville's story is that the incipient scribbler realized his eye for the nuances and vagaries of urban life were totally MFA material, so much so that the Times, seven years ago, noted that his workshop fiction was "so personal he might as well have shown up naked." And so our hero gave up finance for douchery of a more literary sort, as evinced by his italicized byline."William Eville teaches writing at Union Theological Seminary."

Self-discovery accomplished; everybody wins. Except, perhaps a likely-dead street man. Eh, it's a tough world out there; "New York," after all, is "a punch in the face...perfect [e]xcept for the parking."

Why He Moved Into My Car, and Why I Let Him [NYT]

Like it or not, the holidays are upon us. I'm sure when you were stumbling home in the wee morning hours of November 1st in your slutty Madeline Albright costume, you saw the shopkeepers ripping down witches and vampires and putting up pictures of a fat old man who breaks into your house and tries to woo your children with toys. But there's also that other holiday in between, that one dedicated to an afternoon spent face-down on the shag carpet, woozy from tryptophan and big-bottle wine. A time when you listen to and look at your family and wonder "Who are these people??" I was thinking about this the other day and, in the immortal words of Mr. Ed: later that night, I got to thinking. I've decided we'll have a new Thanksgiving. A Gawker Thanksgiving. It's so corny! I know! But, I get sentimental this time of year.

So. How will this work? I think we'll start with the location. Naturally Laurel Touby, founder of MediaArby's, will be our "cyber hostess." (Ugh.) We'll all meet sometime around noon. Julia Allison will bring her darling dog Lilly and Jakob Lodwick will bring his darling fashion lenses. Tinsley Mortimer will arrive wearing an old, soiled Santa suit and just blink confusedly at everyone. (She'll disappear for much of the night, only to be found in the backyard, stuck in a bear trap.) Kristian Laliberte will arrive with his new boyfriend, Elijah Pollack. They'll be so in love! (Later, during dinner, Anna Wintour will lean in close, her breath reeking of gin and clamato juice, purring into your ear "Aren't they just divine together? They're like Paul Newman and Katherine Ross in Butch Cassidy. Except, you know, gay and, um, young.") John Fitzgerald Page will come crashing through the foyer in his Beemer, Eiffel 65's "Blue" blasting loudly, and shove a sweaty bucket of fried chicken into Laurel's hands. Then, just as we think all the guests have arrived, we'll hear a strange hum, a demonic orchestra tuning. As the whole house rumbles, Sean Hannity will shriek, jumping up and down and clapping his hands, "Rupey is here!" Mr. Murdoch will disembark his flaming humpback whale nuclear stagecoach and shove a sweaty Judith Regan into Laurel's feather boa.

James Lipton will utter a dinner bell clarion call from deep within his diaphragm, and all the guests will be seated at the long oak table. There will be a beautiful centerpiece fashioned out of the rawhide remains of Jocelyn Wildenstein's face. The feast will consist of many bottles of Coppola Vineyards wine, PinkBerry soufflés, and turducken. Robert Olen Butler will be the first to get drunk and hurl recriminations at people. "Elizabeth!!" he'll shout across the table at Jann Wenner, "No one poops in South America! It wasn't a sign! It was nature!!" Chris Crocker will defuse the awkward situation by stripping down to his skivvies and doing an old-style fan dance/Britney Spears hyper-sexual mash-up that erotically incorporates Janet Robinson's famous green bean casserole. ("It's the fried onions that really make it work," he'll say in a post-performance YouTube interview with himself.)

Once all are sated and sufficiently boozed up, plates will be cleared by Laurel's faithful butler, Neel Shah. Then, it's on to charades! Mandy Stadtmiller will start. She will pantomime long walks on beaches and summers spent murmuring on porch swings about the big, bright future. In mere seconds team partner Alyssa Shelasky will shriek "SuperPreppy!!" Commenter KarenUhOh, who has been quietly assessing the legal ramifications of all this, will dryly deadpan: "I thought the category was real people." Mandy will run out of the room weeping and farting, having had her hideous secret revealed. Graydon Carter will be next. He will act out a strange series of lilts and affectations, and Lizzie Grubman will yell with delight "Spike! Spike! It's your little fey creature of a son!" A few more rounds will come and go, and of course it will end in a tie and all will be smugly satisfied with their own accomplishments.

The rest of the evening will be devoted to that most revered and corny of Thanksgiving traditions, the actual giving of thanks. The list of thanks will be long and varied. Selected highlights will be:

Tionna Tee Smalls: The film Ishtar
NewToJezebel: Jewish people.
Jeffrey Epstein: Those High School Musical: The Ice Tour tickets he managed to score.
Christopher Hitchens: Religion and Bic razors.
Atoosa Rubenstein: The well-meaning gypsies who style her and, in a bold extension of an olive branch, the Omega Kitties.
Senator Larry Craig: Feet, and a willful spirit.
Josh Schwartz and the rest of the Gossip Girl team: Blacks and Asians.

And, finally, the yoga stick of thanks will be passed to yours truly. And your friend LolCait will say this:

"I find the word 'thanks' inadequate, or even inappropriate. 'Thanks' implies expectation, a resigned 'Phew! Of course these good things were coming after all.' So I'm not thankful, I'm grateful. Things of late seem pretty awful and, truth is, I've Done Nothing During The War, and yet some good things keep coming to me. Six months into my participation in this bizarre social experiment, it is quite baffling to have found both silly entertainment and keen insight on this most cold and unfeeling internet. So I am grateful for a strange new home, for precarious new friendships."

All will be quiet for a moment, and then I will fall down, completely drunk. I will be scooped up by the ever-friendly Josh Ferris (swoon!) and taken from the room.

The night will end as nights do, with sloppy hugs and prolonged, slurred goodbyes. Dear James Kurisunkal will be passed out in the broom closet, spooning a snoring Spencer Pratt, who will still be in his 'Vincent from the Beauty and the Beast television series' Halloween costume. (Or is it a costume??) Ira Glass will dejectedly try to coax Merry Miller into his cab. The Gawker editors will wander off into the night, a bottle of champagne shared between them (with a pour to the sidewalk, remembering Balks, Shafrirs, Spiers, Oxfelds, and others long gone.) Nick Denton will open his umbrella and float whimsically away into the purple night sky. And I will ramble off, thinking of puns and light bulb jokes for the next week. But, before I turn the corner, I will feel a tap on my shoulder. "Don't be alarmed," a voice will say. "It's only me, Douglas." I'll messily grin at him, this most famous of Queens landlords, and say "Oh Douglas. I'm not alarmed. I'm just grateful... Just wonderfully, queasily grateful."

Douglas will shrug his shoulders and walk away, headed off to yuk it up with Michelle and Emily, happy to have been included at all.

"Who are all those strange people?" Patrick Moberg will ask as he stands on the stoop and watches this all unfold. "I don't know," his new wife Camille will respond, robotically petting his arm.

"I've only just met them."

Click to enlarge.

Some highlights:

On hipsters:
What a thought. Both female and male hipsters rubbing their cheese-encrusted genitalia together, the female hipster generally disappointed with the size of the male hipster appendage and the male hipster generally pissed off that yet again, a female hipster turned out to be not so nice under all the layers of deceptively complex hipster clothing. Pasty, cheese-encrusted etc.

...Imagine two filthy hobos gyrating in mud in the buff, you're on the right track. What's that smell.....smells like boiled onions??? Yep that's right boiled onions! Every hipster knows what I'm talking about....their filthy little secrets!

On Indians:
...I now knew she did it bareback, so to speak. Anyhow, to the nasty ass Indian who just started shit on this board, CARE TO COMMENT ? Don't EVEN say anything about whores or whatever, just tell us how badly you treat YOUR women, huh ?!!!!!! You POS no deodorant wearing scum under peoples shoes. P.S. IMMIGRATION is WATCHING.........

On she males:
I really like the passable she-males I have been out to the movies with one named Valerie. She is 5'11 latina she-male and NO ONE could tell the difference she has big 38DD boobs nice hourglass figure and an ass bigger than most women I know.. She has a tattoo on her breast with the name of her ex todd. Sometimes she takes the 7 train watch for her you may see her ;)

On being a corporate executive:
I make $800,000 per year, which is well below average for most CEO's. For a forty hour week, that comes to about $384 per hour. You working class drips are just jealous they we were smart enough to take control of your nation's wealth and resources. Whether we inherited most of our money doesn't matter. You should have gone to Yale like I did instead of wasting your days working in that restaurant.

On what to do if you toast your hoo ha with Nair:
This sounds bizarre, but really works: after aloe vera to get rid of the worse stinging, save your own URINE (!) and dabb it onto the little muffin in the evening. You'll see, by the next morning it will start healing. You should dabb some urine on every day for 4-5 days.
Wont smell, just make sure you let it dry before you put undies/clothes on.
No creme will heal skin problems as fast as urine!

Happy Thanksgiving.

By mealtime, many cooks will be tired of hovering over the turkey and ready to unload it, but just try to find a taker.

"One year my 13-year-old nephew, Josh, was the only one willing to take it on," said Nissa Goldstein, a retired teacher in West Hartford, Conn. "Of course, everyone was shouting instructions at him, and he ended up locking himself in his room and refusing to come out."

But Josh isn't alone; the turkey terror lurks everywhere! "One year the turkey took a long time to cook and I went to carve it after about 13 beers," said Maurice Landry, who lives near Lake Charles, LA. "The way I remember it, I bore down to take off the leg and the whole thing went shooting off the platter and knocked over the centerpiece." Indeed, why wield a knife at all if you aren't a little bit buzzed?

With the proof of a problem's existence established rather indisputably by just two "One year..." recollections, Moskin moves on to the meat of her story. The Goldsteins and Landrys aren't heard from again—which makes one wonder: how exactly were these folks from "West Hartford" and "Lake Charles" identified as prime sources on holidays hysteria? And who's making sure they stay in treatment for good this time?

Butcher's Method Takes Carving Off the Table [NYT]

Waldo went to a farm where "farm animals go to live out long and healthy lives." He wanted to see the majestic birds explore their proper, natural destiny of requiring constant, expensive human care to survive.

Waldo learned that turkeys "are extremely social and are always seen together, earning them the nickname 'The Three Tenors'. One of the turkeys even conspires with other animals at the farm to sneak food when the caretakers aren't looking. He must be the Pavarotti of the group (too soon?)."

Maybe!

Anyway he took some videos of a cute girl petting turkeys and sheep and pigs and aren't they all so adorable! He also included a video of some unlucky turkeys getting abused at a factory farm and if you watch it and still want to eat some damn turkey tomorrow then you are a MONSTER, YOU SICK MONSTER.

Lucky Turkeys Have A Lot To Be Thankful For This Thanksgiving [HuffPo]

"All the perks of stardom and $100 million in the bank can do nothing to diminish the fact that he'll be the man in the middle between Angelina Jolie and his mom, Jane Pitt... [who] has been publicly spotted several times dining, hugging, and even visiting her former daughter-in-law Jennifer Aniston at home, since the exes became exes. That in itself would qualify as monster-in-law material for lesser women. Then I'm sure Angelina got quite the earful from Brad's mom after she confessed to British Cosmopolitan that she took a wild trip to Disneyland while high on LSD."

Sure.

Fuller goes on to analyze hypothetical holiday scenarios involving Ashton and Demi ("What about [Kutcher's mom] Diane's dishes and silverware? Are they up to A list?"), Jake and Reese, and Jen and Ben. Okay, now we're totally convinced that it sucks to be them, for reasons besides 'Bonnie Fuller exists.'

Way back in 2005, somebody wrote a terrific story about easy ways to cook the Thanksgiving turkey. Somebody else wrote a wonderful headline: "The Pilgrims Didn't Brine." And what happened? It turned into fish wrap. Sure, it lurked in some obscure electronic corner on the web, but who'd ever find it? Until now. Because now we can proudly introduce The Thanksgiving Day Topic Page ...Hey Murdoch! How's that Dow Jones Thanksgiving page coming along?

A Thanksgiving dinner in Manhattan [AMNY]

Post Donates Ad Inventory to Cafe Gray Foundation [Eater]
The Ultimate Thanksgiving at Cafe Gray [NYP]

Both are fine, but the papers' accounts make clear it was quite a dramatic event when it happened. We found ourselves wishing we'd been watching the live NBC broadcast so we could have seen it for ourselves, rather than merely relying on the eyewitness accounts in the local papers. We were sure seasoned newsmen like Katie Couric, Matt Lauer, and Al Roker — the parade broadcast's hosts — would have kept us posted on what was happening, and we had no doubt a top-notch news organization like NBC would have found some good pictures to broadcast.

Of course, we would have been wrong. The Times reports:

[W]hen the time came in the tightly scripted three-hour program for the M&Ms' appearance, NBC weaved in tape of the balloon crossing the finish line at last year's parade - even as the damaged balloon itself was being dragged from the accident scene. At 11:47 a.m., as an 11-year-old girl and her 26-year-old sister were being treated for injuries, the parade's on-air announcers - Katie Couric, Matt Lauer and Al Roker - kept up their light-hearted repartee from Herald Square, where the parade ends.

"Will these classic candymen get out of this delicious dilemma?" Mr. Roker asked, referring not to the accident but to the premise of the attraction, a red M&M's attempt to save his yellow counterpart, who had been blown from the basket of a hot-air balloon.

It's America's first morning-news family, folks.

While Others Reported Accident, NBC Stuck to Sunny Re-Broadcast of Last Year's M&M's [NYT]
Related:
Parade Hit By a New 'Blow' [NYP]
Again! Light Falls on Parade [NYDN]
Parade Balloon Hits Light Pole, Injuring Two [NYT]

Bomber Bloodies U.S. Toy Giveaway [WP]

This potpourri round begins with the real David Cross:

Here's what I'm thankful for:
My Freinds, NYC, Zoloft
Comedy stages
A big world to explore
Music
The right to free speech (but not in a Page Six way)
Otters
Beer
Girls
Passionate, reasoned debate
Work
Four distinct seasons
Respect
Easy access to good coffee

And there are 12 more after the jump.

New York's David Amsden:

I'm thankful that I'm not a wild-eyed, rabid-seeming, couch-jumping, cradle-robbing, ADD-disbelieving Scientologist. Or Judith Miller.

Village Voicer Tricia Romano:

I'm thankful that when I was at Ricky's shopping for hair products, two hairdressers happened to be standing in the aisle and gave me advice on how not to destroy my hair. I am thankful for my fat cat Esmerelda, even though I am probably really allergic to her and she is the reason I have been sick for the last month and half. I'm thankful that I have friends who tolerate my annoying, grating presence and listen to each and every tedious complaint with the patience of a buddha. I am thankful for quotable people like Carlos D, Moby, Tommie Sunshine, Fancy, and Murray Hill who make my job easier and more fun. I'm thankful for my Aunt Irma's lasagna which I will be eating tomorrow in combination with her turkey. Yum.

Author and Elle columnist E. Jean Carroll:

I am thankful for:
Cupcakes
Pit Bulls
Driving fast
Staying up late
Peroxide
The return of pubic hair

PR scion Steven Rubenstein:

I'm thankful for blind items.

Maxim UK editor and HuffPost blogger Greg Gutfeld:

I am very thankful for the French (INRA model) AV. Light enough to be held with one hand, with an adjustable latex hood, it fits just about any size. (The latex hood also allows for manual stimulation of the glans during "collection"). It has a latex tubular inner liner fillable by water that is encased in a stiff, comfortable shell. I have a few used ones in case any one is interested. Email me.

MTV's Gideon Yago:

I'm thankful for the fine corps of NYC delivery guys. They keep me happy and lazy and I love them, yoeman, one and all.

GawkerDaddy and Transomer Choire Sicha:

I guess I'm most grateful that I work with a small group of committed and close-knit smokers — a group so seriously devoted to smoking that the non-smokers have actually begun regularly going downstairs on smoke breaks. In this age of increased healthcare costs passed on to the cigarette-loving and pilates at the New York Times, it's nice to be nestled in the bosom of a newspaper where our bad treatment of ourselves is embraced with such gusto. Also: the new Fresca variants. And Jennifer Hudson getting cast in Dreamgirls.

Wonketteer Ana Marie Cox:

I'm thankful for my husband and my pets and the few others in my life that know me well but love me anyway.

Post media columnist Keith Kelly:

I'm thankful I have a job that is indoors all winter

Salon New York chief Kerry Lauerman:

I'm thankful that you can make a living on the Internet again. I'm also relieved that I've avoided Patrick Fitzgerald's scrutiny, and — bonus — managed to hide my close (and remarkably physical) relationship with Robert Novak from the press.

Page Sixer Paula Froelich:

I am thankful for my health (I quit smoking four months ago, before lung cancer set in and, yes, still want to kill everyone), my jobs at the Post and the insider(gainful employment is key to living a decent existence in NYC), my family (specifically, that they live in Ohio, not New York), and Karl the wonder weenie (a dachshund, not an actual weenie. Frankly, as I dumped my boyfriend five weeks ago, am still looking for one of those).

Salon's Rebecca Traister:

I'm thankful that I'm going out of town and won't have to look at Peter Braunstein's wanted poster every time I walk out the door for a couple of days.

Daily News gossip Lloyd Grove:

I'm thankful that, whatever happens, I still have my own hair.

There is so much to be thankful for this year! As I sit down for a heaping plate of Tofurky, I'll say thanks for the past 12 months that brought us Thursday Styles, Men's Vogue and Judy Miller! But the joy of the media wouldn't tell the whole story if I didn't take a moment to be thankful for friends, family and co-workers. L'chaim!

And, more goyishly, Tom Scocca:

I am thankful for the BLT from Shine Deli. White toast, please, and mayo. I am also thankful for Joyce Wadler and for the newsstand under the Flushing Main Street LIRR tracks where I get my Sunday papers.

Marketwatcher Jon Friedman:

After seeing the cruel fates that Judy Miller, Maureen Dowd and Bob Woodward have suffered so far in 2005, I guess I should be VERY thankful that I never won a Pulitzer — the friggin' prize must be jinxed! Seriously, I'm thankful that the media performed so well in New Orleans — and contributed a rare showing of dignity amid journalism's rubble this year.

WWD goliath Jeff Bercovici:

I am thankful Kent Brownridge doesn't read my expense reports.

Advertising Age Media Guy Simon Dumenco:

Right now, as of this very moment, I'm thankful for my DVR and for Family Guy reruns. And for what Ted Koppel did for 25 years. And for Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking. And for the Firefox web browser, with the "ScrapBook" plug-in. And, as always, for Pat Kiernan doing NY1's "In the Papers" on Time Warner Cable in Manhattan. And, what the hell, for Gawker. God bless us, everyone!

And, for Simon, NY1's Pat Kiernan:

I'm thankful for the MTA weekend discount that is about to go into effect. With this "two for one" deal, and the fact that it usually takes twice as long to get somewhere on the subway on a Sunday, now it will feel like I'm getting four times my money's worth!

I am thankful for chewy Cherry-Mint-flavored Tamiflu.

Times Op-Ed diva and man-lover Maureen Dowd's thankful desperation:

I'm thankful that my book tour is almost over; otherwise I'd have to plunge a steak knife through my heart.

And the rehabbed thoughts of Oprah's Book Club star James Frey:

I'm thankful for my wife; my little girl — she makes me laugh, smile, breaks my heart every day; I'm thankful for Oprah's generosity; for my friends, for the improvements shown by the Cleveland Indians, Browns and Cavaliers. I'm thankful for my new mink coat, my old truck that still runs, my doggies my doggies. I'm thankful for Fresh Direct, for Babbo, for the new Taco Bell on Chambers St. I'm thankful for my bike, though not I'm not thankful for the asshole who stole my tire and my seat.

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

People who are touched by stories of others in need — whether from crises such as Hurricane Katrina or the more daily struggles highlighted in The New York Times Neediest Cases articles — to donate money, time, resources.

Metro metrosexual Nick Confessore goes the earnest route, too:

I am very thankful for my family, my friends, and my surprisingly good health. Given the state of the newspaper industry, Im pretty thankful for my job. And I would remiss if I did not say how thankful I am for strawberry-rhubarb pie, which I expect to be consuming in quantity this Thursday. That's some good sh*t.

And, finally, Boldfacer Campbell Robertson, who leavens the mood:

I'm thankful for the Corey Clarks and the Mario Vazquezes, all of the reality show contestants who, despite the deafening chorus of complaints from those in the public eye about the unbearable burden of fame and from the wiser observers about the inherent bankruptcy of celebrity life, still scramble madly toward fame, proving that humans are far more absurd and entertaining than we ought to be. Also: Chipotle burritos.

I'm thankful that my mother doesn't read Gawker.

Ruth M. Siems, Inventor of Stuffing, Dies at 74 [NYT]

I'm incredibly thankful for the increase in price of first-class postage—I'd grown incredibly bored of paying 37 cents.

Feisty foodie Frank Bruni:

I'm thankful for friends who drink their dinners. More lamb shank for me.

And media whore David Carr:

Well, I will be working on thanksgiving. I will be at my desk with my headset, calling a god of my understanding to tell him/her/it how grateful I am that time and architectural trends have not changed Graydon Carter's hair, for Geraldo's continued stalwartness in the face of the ratings of a nightlight for his show, for Anderson Cooper's gee-whiz-who-me? embrace of his new status, for Anna Wintour's willingness to make her way through a hail of pies to adorn herself in dead animals, for Jann Wenner's ruthless pursuit of a destiny only he understands.

Other blessings will land on my desk, including Peter Kaplan's continued willingness to lead the children's crusade at the Observer, Adam Moss's civic and dirty-mindedness at New York, and Espopus, the magazine nobody can pronounce, find or understand. Now if I can just find some cranberry sauce to go with all of that. (And none of that real berries crap. I want the kind that comes out of the can with the ridges still intact.)

Turkey Traps [NYP]

I am thankful for my family and friends, that we finally ran out of Lean Cuisine in the office, and for another year of getting trashed in the press.

And, in turn, her PR partner, Jonathan Cheban:

I'm thankful for so much this year: that there are only 3 PoweR Girls left in the office, that Usher wore a Clarendon shirt to his "In The Mix" Junket. And I'm happy that my partner Lizzie will be wearing underwear for Thanksgiving dinner pictures this year — and Hulk Hogan is not invited.

Earlier: Media Thanksgiving: The Grateful Hacks

I'm thankful for the continued (if waning) power of the American passport; internet access in the most ridiculously remote parts of the world; lax drug laws in Southeast Asia — including but not limited to the coffee-and-ice-cream combination of yaba and Valium; loose Thai girls who insist on condoms; the New York Post's Travel section, which seems to like my ideas; and most importantly, colo-rectoid vaginoplasty, which makes the dreams of Bangkok's ladyboys come true.