In praise of Thanksgiving slothfulness

We are now four days into Thanksgiving Break, and I've done -- essentially -- nothing. Hurrah for me! Oh, I had plans to do lots of stuff. Have a mound of grading I must complete today, desperately need to work on my dissertation, but more than I "needed" to do anything I wanted to do nothing. That's right. Nothing. And that's okay. We spend way too much time doing "stuff" and rarely ever just enjoy doing nothing; resting, for a change. Just enjoying a book or a television program or taking a nap.

Not for me the day-after Thanksgiving sales! Those are hazardous to your health; just too many people fighting over too little merchandise marked down less than it will be a month from now when it really needs to move by year's end. The local paper ran a story today about a man who camped out from Tuesday through Friday morning to buy a computer and a television. Really? He missed Thanksgiving with his family, lived in a tent for three days, and spent who knows how much money on gas to run his generator at night, just to save a couple hundred bucks on some appliances. What an absolute waste of time and money. There was another story about people lined up at 1 a.m. at a deparatment store in anticipation of a 4 a.m. opening. To buy CLOTHES! People!!!! Has America ever experienced a shortage of clothing? I don't think so. Do you think those clothes will no longer be there if you wait until, say, DAWN before getting out of bed and hauling your happy ass down to the retail store? And as if that's not enough, a local Marine was stabbed in the back while helping catch a would-be shoplifter from stealing -- you guessed it -- a computer, a camera, and some video games. The Marine will be fine, thank goodness, but the abject idiot who stabbed him will now spend a few years in the Greybar Hotel kicking himself in the butt for abject stupidity. Then again, maybe not. Anyone who would take a knife to a shoplifting job is probably in the wrong line of work, anyway.

But I digress. The point is, holidays should be spent resting, relaxing, and doing what we all do best: feeling guilty because we're not being productive every waking minute of our lives. Wonder how many hours of worry and guilt it takes to burn off a single slice of pecan pie?