Well. I’m sure I don’t have to remind everyone here of the significance of this week in November, do I? That’s right…it’s the week that Clay is supposed to contact the winners of the “Whoever Makes Clay Cry the Most Wins” Christmas story contest! Ha! Just kidding! That’s not the real name of the contest! The thing is, we’re supposed to make him cry in a GOOD WAY, so that’s going to knock out a lot of my storylines, for sure. I did manage to clean up the dead leech story, though, so that’s good.

Anyways. There’s also another somewhat significant date fast approaching—Thanksgiving. Of course, Thanksgiving is a traditional holiday in which relatives and close friends gather together to create drama and keep you from checking your email for something from Clique. I hate it when that happens.

There’s probably no keeping all that darned demanding, hungry, whiny company away, so you might as well deal with it as best you can. What that calls for is planning, organization and frequent scheduled absences from the kitchen in order to check your email and to also see if Clay blogged. I’d like to offer a few pointers in how to make all that happen so you don’t accidentally go all ClayAikenFan on somebody.

First of all, go ahead and do all the cooking you can in advance. Here are a couple of dishes I’ve found that you can prepare several months ahead of time, and then lovingly sling out on the table when the guests arrive:

1. Turkey: Instructions: Buy turkey in a can. Open can. Dump turkey on decorative cardboard. Find turkey baster in back of drawer. Think about Clay. Go check your email.

Try cross-dressing your turkey for a little added “creativity”. Dress it up like it’s going to a Clay Aiken concert! I always enjoy doing that. Especially the little shoes.

1. Side dishes: Turkey aspic: Directions: Scrape off goo from canned turkey. Go see if Clay has blogged. Add sliced turkey eyeballs. Serve on decorative cardboard and garnish with some kind of leaves. Check email.

Liver Something-or-other:

Directions: Find something brown and put it in a jello mold. Tell your guests you need to make an important VERY PRIVATE telephone call. Excuse yourself and go check your email. Cry quickly. Reapply mascara. Dump brown food-ish type substance out of jello mold onto decorative cardboard.

OMG!! How did that picture of Clay Aiken get in here?!?!? Oh wait, maybe it’s because he’s such a DISH. OMG! BWAH!! See what I did there? That’s called a PUN. I crack myself up. 3. Dessert:

Jello is good enough, in my opinion. Heck, nobody cares. Rinse out the jello mold from the brown dish you prepared earlier. Excuse yourself to send in a trouble ticket to Clique because you don’t seem to be receiving winning emails. Make jello. Dump it out on some decorative cardboard. Go check email again. Check story submission deadline and write quick story about how much Thanksgiving means to you. Say something to make Clay cry, in a GOOD WAY. Submit. Research “unsend” function. Cry.

If you follow my tips, Thanksgiving preparation should only take 10-15 minutes, tops. Then you can spend the rest of this special holiday doing important things, like checking your email. And refreshing Clay’s blog every 30 seconds. I mean, isn’t that the real reason we get the day off? Heeee!

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to find out why my email doesn’t seem to be working.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING, CLAY NATION!!