When writing about Thanksgiving, I’m mindful that it’s traditional, especially for women, to dwell on one of these tried and true topics:

* How to Prepare the Perfect Sumptuous Thanksgiving Bounty with All The Trimmings

* How to Avoid Going Berserk and Attacking Your Annoying Relatives and In-Laws with a Carving Knife

* How Not to Eat a Bazillion Calories and Subsequently Watch Your Ass Double in Size

* Why, Two Decades After Second-Wave Feminism, Women Still Slave Away in the Kitchen While Men Get to Sit on Their Asses and Watch Football All Day

* Or, the most popular of subjects: Feeling All Thankful and Shit

I’m generally not the kind of person to make a maudlin list of things I’m thankful for, but it does seem to be the obligatory Thanksgiving cliche, so I’ll bite. It goes without saying, of course, that I’m thankful for my friends and family, good (mental and physical) health and that I live in a country where I am free to make such sappy and mushy posts like this one. So, here goes a list of 10 random things I am thankful for:

A job

Considering all the layoffs this year, especially in my field of journalism, I am so grateful that I am still gainfully employed in a job that, for the most part, I love and doesn’t keep my ass confined in cubicle hell.

The Internet

I am so, so glad Al Gore invented this, because how else could I waste time when I should be working than by playing Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook? The Internet also gives me the power to work from home, the opportunity to pursue my passions and hobbies, a soapbox by which I can unleash all my innermost rants and raves and allows me to cheaply indulge my book-buying compulsions. But most of all, it’s allowed me to meet so many awesome people — not to mention, my husband — and to discover and read dozens of smart, witty bloggers. Thanks, Al!

My furbabies

My kitties give me so much and all they ask for in return are food (preferably canned), shelter and the occasional rub behind the ears. I am so grateful for them, as well as the chance to open our home this year to two more unwanted kittens and one traumatized cat.

Morningstar Farms

Seriously, because I think we’d be reduced to eating peanut butter and jelly most days if not for its easy-to-fix line of faux meat products.

Dark chocolate, avocados, eggs, coffee, peanut butter, sunshine

And everything else “experts” warned us were harmful that have turned out to be good for us, after all.

My brother and sister-in-law’s poor planning

Their admitted carelessness means that I’ll be getting a new (and our family’s first) nephew in December! I am so very grateful for the chance to mold little Chase into a Bruce Cockburn-loving, tree-hugging, feminist, vegetarian, lefty Pittsburgh Steeler’s fan.

Having a great stylist on speed dial

My prematurely-bald husband simply doesn’t understand how a good or bad hair day can set the tone for the entire day. Yay for a stylist who knows how to cut short hair well!

Netflix and my DVR

I am grateful for Netflix for how else could I wile away the weekends catching up on the entire 11 seasons of Law & Order: SVU on demand? And to my DVR, for allowing me to mercifully fast forward through those god-awful Jenny Craig and Nutrisystem TV commercials.

Bruce Cockburn

And his 28 (29?) albums that have managed to both sooth and preserve my sanity all these years.

Adderall (and a good prescription health care plan)

Since going on Adderall for ADD a couple years ago, I now no longer have to embark on a daily hunt for my car keys (and other misplaced items) and have managed to actually finish a few projects through to completion. Hurrah for legal amphetamines!

I was telling Brandon last night about how I will actually miss George Bush for the sole reason that while he lacks in foreign and domestic leadership, economic acumen, vision and decision-making and IQ points overall, he’s at least provided lots of comedy fodder. Fortunately, we have Sarah Palin to fill the gap. There’s nothing like ceremoniously pardoning a turkey while a turkey bloodbath ensues in the background.

If you’ve suddenly lost your appetite for turkey carcass, check out this Newsweek article about Thanksgiving Day’s forgotten and forlorn: vegetarians.

A visit to my great-aunt Doris’ house meant only one thing: Aunt Doris’ famous chicken n’ dumplings.  Since she lives in Danville, Kentucky, such childhood visits were rare but deliciously anticipated, with a longing for warm, yeasty dumplings and thick chicken-filled broth.

If I close my eyes, I can still remember Doris standing over a bubbling copper pot, wooden spoon in hand.  Like many traditional Kentucky homes, Doris’ kitchen was the nucleus of the house, larger, in fact, than her living room.  In addition to a table that seated four, her husband James had moved a loveseat and large console television into the room so as not to miss any Kentucky Wildcats games.

Doris stopped making her famous chicken n’ dumplings years ago.  And after I became vegetarian over three years ago, I thought such delicacies to be beyond my non-carnivorous palate.  That is, until Morningstar began making their Chik’n Strips Meal Starters.

The boy and I looked up recipes and finding very few for vegetarian chicken n’ dumplings, decided to concoct our own.  It actually turned out very, very well on the first try.  So well, we’ve had it twice this week.  I am listing it here for your culinary delight.

(Note: I don’t measure ingredients, just guesstimate)
1 package Morningstar Chik’n Strips
Diced celery
Diced potatoes
Butter (real or we use the fake spray butter)
2 cans cream of mushroom soup
2 cans vegetable broth
Salt, pepper, garlic, onion powder for seasoning

2 ¼ Bisquick and 2/3 cup milk for the dumplings (according to Brandon)

Saute the celery and potatoes in butter
Mix together celery, potatoes, soup, broth, seasonings and chik’n strips
Bring to boil and simmer for 10 minutes
Add dumplings and simmer for another 10 minutes

Bon appetit.

Brandon and I usually take mini-trips on each others birthdays.  Last year, he chose to go to Nashville for, well, hell if I know.  We like old old country but the new pop country regurgitation they try to pawn off as music leaves us cold.

On one of our nights down there, we got a hankering for pizza and googled local places.  One place stood out; it was a pizza place with a mafia-type theme with pizza names like The Enforcer, One Last Kiss, and Sleepin’ with the Fishes.  I mean, who can resist a crazy themed restaurant with a veggie pizza called The Informant, right?

We drove round and round looking for Mafioza’s Pizzeria, to no avail.  As the hour drew past 9 p.m., we were both ready to eat at the Quickie Mart cafe when we happened along a crowded neon-lit strip near Vanderbilt University.  There, beckoning like a pizza-pie shaped oasis in the desert of the eternally hungry lied Pizza Perfect.

Walking in to the dimly-lit, dingy style place, my expectations were low.  This was a college hangout and dive, populated by kids in jeans and flipflops.  The setting was near cafeteria style, with cheap plastic booths and a football game blaring on the TV.

We ordered the veggie pizza and to our surprise, bit into ecstacy on first bite.  It truly did live up to its name.  So much so that in deciding where to go this year for his birthday (election day, 11/07) Brandon decided he wanted to go back to Nashville for some more perfect pizza.

So, we head off this morning on a 4 and a half hour drive in search of perfect pizza.  Happy birthday, baby.