We're starting John Green and John Green, teammates in life and in love up front. We're taking on York City for the second consecutive day. We took them on in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy. We beat them 3 - 1 and now we're going to be playing them in, here in League 2. Um, the 4th tier of English professional football. And today, it's the day before Thanksgiving here in the United States so I thought that I would talk about some stuff that I'm grateful for because I have a lot to be grateful for. And I'm going to focus on football, but I'm also going to talk about other stuff.

First off I'd like to say that I'm grateful for all of the AFC Wimbledon... Oh, come on John Green! You're better than that! I'm grateful for John Green's dogged defending. I'm grateful for all the AFC Wimbledon supporters who make it possible for me to... Well I'm no longer a semi-professional FIFA player because all of the income from this goes to charity. I still get to play FIFA and I, you know, now we get to be one of the biggest sponsors that AFC Wimbledon has, which is pretty amazing. So I'm really grateful for that. So, thank you for watching, thank you for supporting the Wimbly Womblys. Even those of you who are confused about whether this team is real or fake or what, thank all of you! 

But a quick explanation on that 'cause I see it a lot in comments. This team is real in the sense that, you know, we invest it with meaning. However the players on this team are largely fictional but there is some, it's like a cousin relationship, a sort of... It's like, it's like different iterations of the Doctor in Doctor Who is the kind of the relationship between the real AFC Wimbledon and the team that you're watching now. So no, the AFC Wimbledon Wimbly Womblys are a fictional team. AFC Wimbledon is the actual real life team that plays in actual Wimbledon. 

Oh no! You were offside. You're cheating! Don't complain about cheating! The actual AFC Wimbledon that is the club that is historically linked to Wimbledon FC that was then dismantled and moved against their will to Milton Keynes. That club is real and we really do support them by sponsoring them so that they can hopefully continue to be in the Football League and maybe, you know, even go up and one day themselves play the MK Dons. Oh! It has to be and it is! Oh, it is!

"Bald John Green, John Green.
He gives it all for the team.
Upon his mustache we're keen.
Bald John Green, John Green."

He's a finisher. Absolute, top quality finisher. I'm so grateful for Bald John Green, for teaching me when I was at Swindon that I had really lost my way, that as a manager I was focusing on gingers instead of points, that I was trying to recreate the past that could never be recreated. All of these things Bald John Green taught me and I'm so grateful to him. I don't know where we'd be without him. And I'm grateful to him for loving Other John Green. I'm grateful to them for being the most interesting marriage in all of sports.

Oh! Off the post! That would have been a beautiful goal though. 'm grateful, I'm grateful to my brother for starting the Hankgames channel in the first place. I mean what a magical run we've had here at Hankgames. Oh! Off the post again! We're peppering the posts, Meredith. Meredith had a great idea for the nickname for Francomb, Francombstein. Francombstein, Francombstein?  Was that your idea or...? No, it's a Nerdfighter's idea. It's a Wimbledy, it's a Wimbly Wombly supporter's idea. Anyway, we're giving credit for it to Meredith. 

Oh! Almost. that was like a Luis Suárez style header. I'm grateful that Liverpool, at least as of this recording, are doing well in the league, bringing me joy that I haven't felt in many years.  I'm grateful for Steven Gerrard, the most beautiful man in the world of soccer or any other world. I'm grateful, I'm grateful for Crash Course and all the people who make it possible, both the people who make it possible by, like, writing it and consulting on it and editing it and, you know, doing all the stuff to make it happen. But then also all the people who, like, make it happen through Subbable and by supporting it by watching it and sharing it with their students and all of that stuff. It's crazy, it's so cool. 

Oh, you know what else is cool!? Other John Green! Oh, he never, gah! The kid doesn't have any getup in him, I love him so much, Meredith. I love him so much, I'm so grateful for him. I also, I also am really grateful, like, this year has been nuts. I'm really grateful for Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort and Nat Wolff who played Hazel and Gus and Isaac in, in The Fault In Our Stars movie. You know, you never know if a movie is going to be, like what the actual, like, thing is going to end up being and I hope it's good, but I think it will be good. Certainly haven't seen any indication that it will be anything other than good. 

But regardless, like, those relationships with those, those young people that I have now are so special to me and I feel so lucky that, that such talented kids wanted to be a part of the movie. It's really, that's something I'll always remember as long as my memory works, the time that we got to spend together and just being able to spend time with people who understand the characters so deeply, care about them as much as I do. It really was very special. 

Ya Bamba! No, not a good crosser. He's a finisher, not a crosser. I don't blame him. He was like "I don't understand why you didn't just have me shoot, Manager Green? I'm a finisher." No! Terrible... Oh, I followed it with an unnecessary slide tackle. I'm not grateful for York City's surprisingly robust performance here in the first half. Oh, boy. But we are winning and that's the most important thing.

Seb Brown I don't think has touched the ball today. I'm grateful that I rarely have to sing the song that I've written about Seb Brown because our defense is so strong and sturdy. Um, yeah. It's just been a crazy, it's been a crazy good year and I think one of the things, the nice things even, you know, when I've kinda looked back on bad years or difficult years in my life. One of the nice things about Thanksgiving is that it is that time of pause. We don't have a lot of those times anymore in this, like, hyper-secular world of ours. It's nice to be able to, like, pause and reflect and be, try to, you know, find the stuff that you are grateful for even if it's been a rough year.

I know that, yeah. So, I mean, you know, the most important thing that I'm grateful for this year, I was waiting for the second half for this, is having a baby. The birth of my daughter and getting to watch her grow and, yeah. It's just so fun. It's so fun to be her dad and Henry's too and like... Oh! Yes! What a beautiful goal! That one's for the kids! That one's for my kids, I love them both so much. I'd just like to give that shout out to my children, Henry and Alice, I scored that goal for you. Let's... You know what, Henry and Alice? Let's just look at a replay of that 'cause it was fricking beautiful. Um, yeah. I just want to watch. I just want to watch the replay. No, what are you doing? What are you doing? What? What? No, I want to watch the replay... Ah, whatever. What... You know, that's the great thing about Hankgames though is that I can show it to the forever.

Henry's a big Wimbly Wombly fan actually. He enjoys this. He always says, he always says "I want the blue team to win." And I'm like "I want the blue team too. That's perfect, we're on the same, exact same page on this topic." So yeah. I mean, it's like, having kids is very challenging. It's like hard to know how to be a good parent and you never do know if you're doing the right thing and, like, you know, kids are, they don't... There's a lot that they don't know how to do and you've got to teach it to them and all that stuff is hard. But, like, it's so fun and, like, in those moments where you can take the time to pause and reflect, like, yeah. I'm just so grateful. I'm so grateful that they're healthy and that they're happy and they bring, yeah. They bring, they both bring so much joy to my life and, yeah. And for my marriage, for Sarah. That's, being married is also pretty awesome.

So that's the stuff that I'm really grateful for, is like the personal stuff. It's funny, like, I mean, I always thought, particularly when I was in my twenties, I always, like, basically thought that, like, the point of life was to try to be professionally successful. Ohoho!

"Bald John Green, John Green
He gives it all for the team,
Upon his mustache we're keen,
Bald John Green, John Green."

So I did think that, like, the point of life was to have professional success and to be fair, I mean, I'll tell you, the AFC Wimbledon Wimbly Womblys are a lot more fun to watch when they're winning than when they're losing. Like, it is nice to be, it is nice to experience success and I've had, I've really enjoyed this year just because The Fault In Our Stars has reached such a broad audience and Crash Course has grown so much and we've launched Mental Floss which has been really fun and I'm really grateful to the people who work at Mental Floss for entrusting us with their magazine that I've liked ever, you know, for years and years. So that's all been awesome but, like, the main joys of life... That could have been more beautiful than it was.

Do you have a black screen, Meredith? I have a black screen. It's a little worrisome because I was just, I was in the middle of this, I was so grateful and now, now I just, now I just see blackness. How am I doing defensively? Oh no! So we just have to listen for sounds. OK. I'm gonna try to finish this game even though I'm just staring at a black screen. I'm not gonna quit. I can win this game. I'm up four-nothing. Surely staring at a black screen isn't that big of a deal. I'm gonna try to turn on the TV. Oh, it did turn on. That's encouraging. Hold on, hold on. We're gonna get back. How many goals will I have given up in the interim? No-one knows yet. Come on. Come on. Oh! They just, they didn't score! They didn't score! Oh, you had it, Platt, what were you thinking? We're back. We're back in the game. We gave up zero goals. I just played FIFA with a completely black screen for, like, two minutes and gave up zero goals. I don't want to brag about how great I am. Not my best pass. That all worked out better than expected.

Yeah. So anyway, I always thought that, like, professional... And I have been so grateful for the, the, like, good luck that we've had and the good fortune that we've had on those fronts, but, like the point of life overwhelmingly, there's, like, just the... An overwhelming majority of the fulfillment that you have in life is about the people you are close to in your actual real life. I don't mean just, like, physically, I mean, the internet can be your actual real life as well. But the people you are close to and the people, you know, the life that you have with them which sometimes involves work but usually isn't primarily about work at least for me. That's where, like, the real fulfillment is so...

That's also a little bit of what, like, you guys as, you know, like people inside the internet, like, inevitably don't see from my life and no matter how much I, like, try to talk about it, I mean, I try not to talk about it too much 'cause a lot of people in my family, a lot of my close friends are pretty private people but, like, you know, it's just, that's like, you know... It's important to have that private life I guess. But yeah, I'm so grateful. So, yeah. That's what I'm really grateful for.

But, I mean, we're also top of the league, we're in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy, the F.A. Cup, our competition which the actual real life Wimbledon FC won in 1988, one of the greatest upsets in the history of football, hasn't even started yet. So I mean, you've got to be grateful right now if you're a Wimbly Wombly fan because everything looks beautiful and nothing hurts. I mean the potential is there, the hope is alive. Next season we could be playing the MK Dons twice a year. Can you imagine that, Meredith? To play the team that used to be us. To be able to sing to them, humiliate them. I don't want to crit... I know there's a lot of MK Dons fans who are also Wimbly Wombly fans, I don't want to alienate them, but you might not want to watch those games if they happen. Thank you for watching, best wishes.