'Twas the night before Power Ball

On the day before I became a millionaire, I woke up with my baby boy and my husband at 5:30 in the morning.  That was baby boy's choice.  We braved the cold in the dark and fed our herd before work.  I kvetched with a dear friend on g-chat about being broke and rationalized that it would make me a (insert rationalizing positive thing to be here...) more compassionate person, more creative thinker, an artistic genius, closer to my roots, appreciative of each dollar, better wife and mother after enduring mutual struggles early on, etc.  Then again, movies always make painting a room with your partner look like an adorable romp filled with cute cut-off shorts and accidental paint strokes before collapsing in a pile of painty giggles on a floor mattress in the middle of the room with magically appearing chinese take-out when the reality is that it starts with getting sweaty moving furniture, inhaling a lot of dust, getting buried in socks that have no match and piles of unfiled papers, scraping, priming, taping, and being too tired to actually paint and then you are stuck out of your room for a month because it takes that long to finish the project and eventually put the furniture back where it started instead of in an inspired new Real Simple advised arrangement.   But anyway, on the day before I became a millionaire, I also forgot my wallet in my bowling bag.  I didn't have any money anyway. but I did need groceries.  Luckily, my dad still carries cash and he spotted me $100.  With my roll of 20's in hand, I traveled to the way back machine typing subpoenas on a real life typewriter in a hall-closet at the office.  Typewriters are also less romantic in real life than they are made out to be although I think I might like to bang away on one if it was more than the name and address of people who owe us money.  If the recipients of these subpoenas pay up, that will be $144,000.00 heading our way.  They probably won't, but it won't matter because I'll be a millionaire anyway.  I left the office at 4 to pick up little man at his sitter and then we parked our big 'ol truck at the grocery store.  The $100 cash limit was a fun exercise.  We won the game clocking in at $80.48 which was about $100 less than a typical grocery run.  Clearly, we can cut some fat.  But we won't need to soon!  On the way home from the grocery store, I almost ran out of gas, literally.  I could feel the truck starting to struggle and I asked Soraya Sarhadi Nelson to just talk me through it since it would simply suck to be stuck on the side of the road in the dark with a baby on a below freezing night less than 5 miles from home. It would be a lame out of gas story and not really an adventure.  We coasted in to C&S on fumes.  After the grocery purchase, I had $23 and change burning a hole in my coat pocket.  Started putting gas in the truck, walked around to grab the boy, and then leapt back to the other side stop that fuel from flowing at $20.01.  Even the clerk was impressed with my agility. Little did he know, I was inspired.  My $3 cash after that $20.01 bought me a $1 scratch ticket (loser) and the $2 game changer I promptly lost between the truck and the kitchen (I have since found it).  At home, I made sure to savor 5 blackberries (muires) as I unloaded the groceries.  Blackberries were on sale this week.  Not so for blueberries.  I wanted to remember what tasting individual berries and counting them out to make them last felt like.  I played with baby boy, cooked chili, told the hay man that I needed more time for our next payment (please be patient b/c I have no idea from whence it will come...if not for that power ball ticket) and then settled in to watch a few TV shows with my husband when he finished tucking in our animals and our son.  I attempted to ignore the gnawing feeling that I'm late on Christmas that the marketing world has successfully given me.  It is still only November.  I actively ignored my growing to do list and the marketing campaign of my own I concocted earlier in the day regarding horse sales and leasing.  Instead, I wrote.  It's pretty important to commemorate the days that you may otherwise not remember but that you think you will never forget.  Clearly, the last day before my reign of benevolence is worthy of recording.  Remember when...  I'm so winning the lottery tonight.