A 98% Good Day

How to spend a birthday:

1) Take the day off. Preferrably on a day when it's not raining for a change.

2) Cash in a completed frequent drinker card for a free sugar-free vanilla latte on your way to the outlet mall.

3) Hit Hobby Lobby and find several good bargains that are all on clearance or on sale. Use your 40% off coupon on the one item you found to buy that was not already marked down.

4) Mosey on down to the outlet mall and start your day at Border's, where you use your 30% off coupon to acquire a Sherlock Holmes audiobook for next week's commute.

5) On impulse, visit the Calvin Klein outlet and buy a pair of size 10 jeans. The ability to get into size 10 jeans is a new development that should not be ignored.

6) Next go to Coldwater Creek and finally locate a pair of brown slacks that you've been seeking for several weeks.

7) Head on to the other outlet mall and spend a pleasant hour trying on clothes at Chico's and find yourself having to send the clerk back for smaller sizes. Repeatedly. Find another pair of heretofore elusive brown slacks. And several other pieces you didn't realize that you desperately needed. Use a 15% off entire purchase coupon in addition to the normal frequent buyer discount to save $73 on the whole lot.

8) Start drifting home, stop for a quick meal at Luby's, then a brief stop at Half-Price Books where you pick up two great books on crafting dollhouses, 2 books of collected FoxTrot cartoons that have been on your Amazon wishlist for awhile at quadruple the price, and the last of Dan Brown's books that I did not yet have on audio.

9) Get home and collect puppy kisses.

10) Now comes the 2% bad. A check of today's mail and Mother's idiot insurance company finally responds to my fax to disenroll and claims that I can't do that under the rules established by Medicare. Wanna bet? The feud resumes Monday morning. I refuse to spoil my birthday weekend getting mad at those morons.

11) Check your email and discover birthday greetings from 1 aunt, 1 old friend, 3 cousins, 1 co-worker and a sister-in-law. Soon thereafter get a phone call and a half-hour's pleasant conversation with another aunt I don't get to talk to very often.

12) Collect some kitten snuggles.

13) Head to bed and contemplate that tomorrow is a holiday. Plan an assault on the local antique shops and an enchilada plate at La Cabana.

Just as you decide your life sucks canal water, it will surprise you with a really good day.

LSW