North Maple Rag

I'll be having a quiet holiday here in New York, which is fine. School's been hectic and it will be that way for the next month, so it'll be nice to have a quiet day featuring a good meal. I'm already looking forward to going home for Christmas and like every year, I'm excited simply because I like "the holidays." That's actually one of the things I'm most thankful for this year. A lot of people don't love the holidays and often for good reasons. This season, unfortunately, reminds too many people of loved ones they lost and troubled times. It also has a knack for illuminating the flaws in relationships, especially familial ones. I'm lucky that I still feel like a kid on Christmas Eve. I'm lucky that despite having lost people that I love, Christmas reminds me more of how much I appreciate my family. And, I'm lucky that no life-altering trauma has ruined this time of year.

All that's what I'm thankful for right now, but I'm also really quite shallow, so I'm thankful for a number of things, too. Here's a few of them:

• Grey's Anatomy
• cupcakes
• my new pajama pants
• my iPod
• Fresh Direct
• pad thai
• hooded sweatshirts
• good beer