Two of the most frequently asked questions I receive are: "How many stuffed animals do you own?" and "What is your favorite Thanksgiving food?" Seeing those two questions side-by-side makes me think of stuffing, which is probably my least favorite food (food product? food mishap? food crime?) that one commonly finds on Thanksgiving tables. To be perfectly honest, I've never actually eaten stuffing, but I hate it passionately nonetheless. (Logic!)

So to answer the latter question, my favorite Thanksgiving staples are rolls (mmm, butter) and mashed potatoes (mmm, more butter). When I suggested to a friend that I could live on mashed potatoes, he replied, "I tried that for dinner once." He likened the experience to ingesting wet cement. I won't be trying that anytime soon, but it won't stop me from filling half my plate with starchy goodness.

(Making little sandwiches from the leftover rolls and leftover turkey on the day after Thanksgiving? Oooh, that is the best. Why can't turkey sandwiches taste that amazing every day of the year?)

As far as stuffed animals (the toys) are concerned: I own way too many. I only keep three in my bedroom: my teddy bear from Build-a-Bear, my sock zombie, and of course, Juan Pedro the sock monkey. I also actually keep a giant stuffed white tiger in my closet, since I didn't want to risk putting it in the basement with the others, in case the basement should flood or become home to a swarm of toy-eating locusts. (YOU NEVER KNOW.) White tigers are my favorite animals in the world, and until I can own a real, growly, scary one as a pet, the quiet, fluffy version in my closet is going to have to survive.

It's been ages since I looked at the others, but I'm selfishly refusing to donate them. What snot-nosed brat born in 2005 is going to keep a bedside log of which ones got to sleep on the bed last night in order to prevent favoritism? Huh? When they build an orphanage exclusively for obsessive-compulsive genius children, THEN I'll consider parting ways with Raggedy Ann, Raggedy Andy, Bunny, White Teddy Bear, Black Teddy Bear, Big Bird, and all the other unnamed fuzzballs I own. (For some reason, I never felt compelled to attach names to my stuffed animals. I just referred to them by what animal they were, and we dreamt up little quiet places in nature where we could all read books together.)

Anyway, I am quickly running out of curse words to mutter at the slow-moving traffic in the rain-soaked state of Indiana, so I think I'm going to use what precious battery remains on my phone to look up the phrase "down the stairs with you!" in every language Google Translate offers.