...one of those mornings...

So, interesting weekend. I beat my daughters at a six-hour Monopoly game. It took forever, as we each had one of each color group. Except me, I had all the yellows. So I had hotels on there, after which point my daughters decided to trade between themselves to try to mount a united front of some sort. Anyway, the 6-year-old didn't last long after that. Eventually, I got it so that I had hotels on Mediterranean, Baltic, Oriental, Vermont, Connecticut, Atlantic, Ventnor, Marven Gardens, Pacific, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. My 8-year-old only had the reds covered with hotels, but had like $5,000 in cash. Of course, I had NO cash, or "operating capital", you might say. And sure enough, I kept hitting the reds and she kept missing mine. I'd pass go, and either hit Income Tax, or land on Reading (she owned all 4 railroads, too). Everything else I had was mortgaged. Luckily, I'm well-versed in the Law of Large Numbers....the more rolls, the more likely she'd start hitting mine. Eventually she started having to pay up....and then I accepted her two oranges in lieu of the $1150 rent on a yellow. There weren't any more hotels, so I loaded those up with 4 houses each right away. Finally, she landed on one of them, the rent was $700. She had already sold off her hotels/houses the time before, so she mortgaged her properties, counted up her cash....$699. Oh, sorry, thanks for playing!! :)

Then it was off to my mom's for birthday presents! $50 from home depot so we can buy stones to finish our front walkway....when we last left off in May there was no crabgrass all over the place, however. Also some audio CDs on the history of baseball, a Red Sox - emblem set of serving platter and bowl (why? why? why? really? to serve turkey and mashed potatoes on Thanksgiving?) Also, a bag of Popnots brand popping corn, which will deliberately only half-pop so it's extra crunchy. (I highly recommend these things to popcorn fans.) Dinner was steak, potatoes, corn on the cob, and Italian bread. Fantastic! Completely made up for the store cake....plus the hideous vanilla ice cream that Hood thought would be good to color with annatto -- the same orangish dye that makes cheese look stupidly orange, now makes vanilla ice cream look peachy.

Anyways, the "one of those mornings" parts. I was assigned to take Erika's car in for a tune-up so we can drive it on the dirt roads in Maine. She needs to pass emissions testing for the state of Connecticut, and her "check engine light" needs to be fixed, too, as that was part of why she failed the testing a couple of months ago. So I was ready to go, and suddenly the corn and bud light I had last night decided to give nature a call, if ya know what I mean. The funny part there is that we use Charmin toilet paper in our house...and the wrapper mentioned that it was a 6-pack of MEGA rolls, which are 4 times the size of "regular rolls", apparently. Then, the button on my pants for work fell off, the threads were a bit worn, so I had to rummage around upstairs for my sewing kit to put THAT back on...have I mentioned how lousy I am at threading a needle? Luckily, Erika had some pretty good-sized needleholes. Next, I forget Erika's car keys in the house after setting the alarm, so I have to go back in. THEN, I can't start her car.....and in attempting to find the phone number where she worked, my phone found me a business with the exact same name, only instead of Monroe, CT, it was Monroe, NC. No help. Anyways, apparently you have to really slam the clutch pedal all the way down to the floor, and I wasn't pushing it in far enough. So she's asking me if I'm pushing the clutch pedal in, which sounds kinda obvious and patronizing, and sure enough it starts right up. GRRRrrrr....and to top it off, an old lady cuts me off up hill, pulling out of her driveway and failing to notice the traffic moving at 40-45 mph.

A couple of quick "random hits"....

Carly Simon's "Anticipation" song was used in Heinz Ketchup ads years ago....but really, no constipation remedy thought of using it? If "Anticipation" is "making me wait" according to the original lyrics, then really......

Also, please remember that as a present, cash is always good. I have sorta trademarked this phrase: "It's like a gift certificate, redeemable ANYWHERE!"