Thanks for the help, but it isn't always practical to join all of the surfaces in a set of polys.
As the target of a subdivision operation, I tend to keep quads for geometry wherever possible, especially when it forms a concave object like this one --- here's a subdivision sample using the same geometry - you really need to keep certain objects as multiple polys...
There are other advantages to keeping your surfaces divided, such as being able to copy/separate sections of an object at a time.