I'm thankful for being financially independent. The economy is still a long way from recovering, and although it would be easy to complain about the long hours, the horrendous commute, or the fact that I'm making less than I was a couple years ago, the fact is that my wife and I are both employed, we both enjoy what we do for the most part, and we make enough money to pay the bills and even put a little away for the things we love like travel. I'm thankful for that, and I can only hope that the economy improves in 2012 so that everyone can enjoy this same blessing.

I'm thankful for my friends, and especially for my wife. It's a rare thing in this world to find someone who will truly accept you and love you for who you are. I'm incredibly thankful to all the people in my life who know all my faults and quirks and issues and for some reason are still there for me when I need them. Each and every one of them deserve to be celebrated and I hope that everyone has at least one person in their life who accepts them, loves them, and celebrates everything that they are.

I'm thankful for my health. I could be in better shape and, sure, I was just in the hospital this week to have a couple of questionable bumps and lumps removed, but I'm approaching my 30th birthday having relatively few health issues. I'm grateful for the fact that I still have the physical ability to do almost anything I want to do, and I'm blessed to (hopefully) still have enough years left to do all the things I want to do before I depart from this world.

I'm thankful for the freedoms and liberties that we enjoy. There are a lot of places in this world where people don't have the freedoms that we enjoy. As much as we might complain about who's in the Oval Office, or which idiots voted to pass which laws, or how unfair the 1% have it... in most cases we have the freedom to live where we want to live, do what we want to do, love who we want to love, worship who we want to worship, and vote for what we believe in. I'm thankful for the fact that, despite all of the faults our country may have and all of the wrongs that still need to be righted, most people have the freedom to be themselves.