I love it when I can watch a whole season, or a whole bunch of seasons of a really good tv show. I know you might think I am shallow, or I should be reading a book, or writing more blog posts, but let’s remember, we here at the gratitude-a-thon get to decide what we’re grateful for, and today it’s Friday Night Lights. (Lighten up, it’s not like I was watching the Kardashians or something.)

I had gotten into this show on a vacation in Europe a few years ago. We would have a jam-packed day and before bed, it was something we could all watch together, and something that was actually in our native language. But somehow, while I really liked it, I lost my mojo for it when I arrived home and never continued watching it. This past weekend, trying to take my mind off this stupid “PAIN IN MY NECK,” combined with the March Madness Insanity monopolizing all the people in my house, except my dog, I needed a little something something that could entertain me, and the first of five seasons of Friday Night Lights did the trick.

This is a really good show. It’s nuanced and smart, and a real character sketch of a small, rural Texas town. I really like that Kyle Chandler dude, who plays the coach. He’s so earnest and sort of adorable, that even though I DESPISE FOOTBALL, I kind of love him. And the premise is great. A football-crazy town where that pigskin means everything to everyone, has a new high school coach (the cutie Kyle guy) and in the first game, the star quarterback gets paralyzed (which made me stop breathing for like 60 seconds, before I remembered that it was just a tv show), and the rest of the season is just how this event will change the football season, and possibly that of the cutie Kyle guy coach and his family’s future. But while there are all the key players you might expect, the overzealous and bossy father who recruits another quarterback from New Orleans (a victim of Katrina) behind the coach’s back, and the perfect cheerleader, who was going out with the perfect quarterback, and planning the perfect life, before the accident, and the best friend of the QB, who is broody and bad boy and totally hot, and is sleeping with his now paralyzed friend’s girlfriend, but is so cute, I can’t even not like him for doing it, there’s also really great writing. And great acting and reacting. And beautifully crafted character development.

Anyway, I am into like the fourth episode, and the cool and fun thing is there are four more seasons! Pay dirt. Gratitude touchdown!