Sometimes, life is like Monopoly

I love board games. Some personal favorites include Trivial Pursuit (don't even try to beat me at the Disney version), Apples to Apples, and Risk (What can I say? I am a total nerd), but really, I love them all. Even Monopoly (or, as we liked to call it growing up, due to its length and repetition, Monotony). I'm a little rusty, but at one time, because I have played Monotony Monopoly so often over the years, you could show me the picture on a Chance or Community Chest card, and I could tell you what the card said and how much money I needed to spend/receive. A few examples:

Grand Opera Opening Night: Collect $50 from each player for seats

Receive for Services: $25

Get out of jail free

And a personal favorite...

Bank error in your favor: Collect $200

Why do I love that card so much? Something about the look on Uncle Pennybags' face has always made me smirk (sort of like the images on these warning signs), but that's not the only reason I like this card. I like this one in particular because recently, not due to a bank error, but due to my own negligence and general inability to do simple mathematics (let's just say that when depositing money into your account, it's best to add the numbers, not subtract them), I found myself with a very not-small sum of money that I hadn't realized I had. This makes me exceedingly grateful. This gratefulness (gratitude? I iz English majur. I iz smrt) has inspired me to compose a list of other things I am thankful for this week:

1. Pizza Pub pizza (which is just as delicious for breakfast and/or lunch as it is for dinner)

2. Jalapeno-infused queso dip

3. An upcoming girls' night

4. An impending haircut

5. Sam's Club

6. my mother-in-law (I should pause here to denote that this list is in no particular order and not in order of appreciation)

7. my husband (previous note applies)

8. Beth Moore (even if I do want to beat her up and steal her wardrobe every time I see one of her videos - Lord, help me. I think I might have struggles with envy.)

9. Coke Zero

10. yard sales and good friends who are willing to host/organize them so that I don't have to

This list is in no way comprehensive. I have much to be thankful for. Just thought I'd take a minute and give a shout-out to some of the things that are making me smile this week. What are you thankful for, readers?

I'm done making excuses

I'll just show up when I show up, okay? And we can just pretend that my six-month-long disappearances are normal or socially acceptable or at least expected, okay? Okay. Let's just admit that I'm busy, I'm lazy, and I'm terrible at time management. I can hope that one day those things magically resolve themselves (and that my eyebrows suddenly decide to read 1 Peter 3 and just SUBMIT already), but until then... you get what you get. And today, what you get is a list. (I'd claim that I am going to do this every Friday, but ... we just talked about that. I'm a liar. A lying, lazy liar who lazily lies.) So, because it is Friday and I am here and I don't really have anything better to do...

1. I recently (i.e., this morning) decided to cut out Julian's morning nursing session.

2. At the moment, he has decided that he no longer likes me.

3. Upon pumping (sorry male readers, if I have had any), I discovered that he apparently only gets 2 oz. in the mornings anyway, so I'm not sure why he cares so much. I put 6 oz. of beverage in his sippy. He's getting 3x the fluid, and he can drink it on the go!

4. He's happily chewing on his Papa's shoe now, so I guess he's over it.

5. I'd try to stop him, but I know it's useless. He cannot be stopped. He cannot be deterred. He cannot be dissuaded.

6. That boy loves shoes. (In a goat-like, I should be worried about tetanus sort of way, not a Manolo Blahnik, I should be worried about his teenage years sort of way.)

7. My daughter thinks that tortilla chips are an acceptable breakfast food.

8. I feel like a hypocrite telling her no when I just ate leftover garlic bread.

9. I told her no anyway.

10. She's having a banana instead.

11. I hate bananas.