"For months, I've searched for a leader to finish this journey alongside me and join me in making Washington work for the American people," Obama triumphantly preluded. "Today, I've come back to Springfield to tell you I've found that leader."

On that fall day, I anxiously awaited their first public appearance together with bated breath. I prepared to wipe away tears of partisan joy. Barack Obama was about to change my life. He was publicly announcing his selection of Senator Joe Biden of Delaware to be his running mate.

I'd spent the nerve-wracking spring and summer of 2008 crossing my fingers, biting my nails, and feigning overconfidence in the Obama campaign. Unlike the bandwagon of America's youth (of which I was still somewhat a part, at the time), I was bitterly pining for the lost pipe dream of another Clinton in the White House.

Sure, I knew Hillary could've been and was a viable Veep prospect, but even I didn't condone packing the ego sardines that tightly on Pennsylvania Avenue.

But when it came down to the final three, and Joe Biden was on the list, I knew there was hope for me as a converted Obama disciple.

"Please pick Joe. Please pick Joe."

He picked Joe.

I was thrilled! I threw my full support behind the Obama-Biden ticket, Hillary be damned. Not because of Obama, mind you. Of course not. But because of Joe Biden.

Since it was already in the stars that Obama would shoot straight into the Oval Office on the wing of his maniacal popularity, it looked as though Biden as the nation's runner-up was an assured reality. I cast my ballot — the first election in which I'd actually voted at the ballot box — and said a prayer. And I'm not a religious woman.

Joe Biden won. Oh, and so did Barack Obama. If the trend continues, we'll have world peace shortly.

It's no secret that I heart Joe Biden. I temporarily wiped the stars from my eyes long enough to see Joe glide onto Jay Leno's stage on Friday evening. My adoration for him is beginning to rival my affinity for Bill Clinton. I am an unwavering, unapologetic Joe Biden fangirl.

But for those of you that don't know Joey like I do, here's why I dig the dude from Delaware so.

We have walked the same hallowed halls, and we have the same document on our walls.
And I don't mean that one-size-fits-all certificate from my senior year trip to the White House, but close. Both Biden and I graduated from Syracuse University College of Law (go Orangem ... people!), the preeminent institution of legal education in upstate New York. As long as we pretend Cornell is invisible, ahem.

In fact, he's arguably my alma mater's most famous alumnus. Besides me, of course. Which earns him an automatic soft spot.

He's just like you and me.
I understand you didn't all go to Syracuse Law like Joey and me. You can still be just like us.

Anyone that can drop an f-bomb like Biden and be effective in the country's most heavily regulated profession deserves your utmost respect. I admire his expert command of the most versatile word in the English language. I strive to achieve the Joe standard.

And don't you get all holier-than-thou on me about the plagiarism thing. Like you never plagiarized works as a student or in your career? Not buying it. You just never got caught. But Santa left a lump of coal in your stocking in 1984 for a reason.

He's a mighty good man.
If this was the '90s, Salt 'n Pepa would've dedicated their urban homage to our boy Joe.

After his first wife, Neilia, and his 13-month-old daughter were killed while Christmas tree shopping (try to keep your eyes dry now), Biden began commuting every day from his Delaware dwelling to D.C. — a three-hour round-trip commute — to be home every day for his two surviving sons.

To further ward off absentee father syndrome, he made the daily trek for the entirety of his tenure in the Senate.

And while we're on a roll, Joe and his second wife, Jill, were married in 1977. And they can't keep their paws off each other to this day.

What a mighty, mighty good man.

His brilliance blinds me.
Those teeth, those teeth!Dentures or no, there's nothing like a Joe Biden mugshot.

Face it: You're sold, too. You'll be drinking the Joe juice before you can say, "Biden-Obama 2012."