L'Chaim!

today for lunch dessert i was really craving cinnamon life cereal:

alas, the only box of cinnamon life cereal i had on hand was pretty long expired:

i was sad. but then i thought, what the hell? and reached my grubby little hand inside the box...and it was still tasty! let's forget about the implications of what makes a cereal still taste good a year after it expires, and never mind that i was willing to pour milk on it and eat it anyway. let's just bask in the awesomeness that is eating the thing you want when you want it:

Proof That Dad Hates Me

the other day, the unluckiest thing that's ever happened to anyone sent me into a pretty severe panic spiral:



yes, that's right, i had a voicemail from my grandmother. which could only mean one thing: someone gave her my phone number. you may think i'm a horrible person for avoiding my own grandma, but you'll just have to trust me on this one. she says things like:

so, yeah, i didn't want my self-esteem to drop any further for the time being. i was so upset, i had to sniff out the source of my unhappiness. at first, i accused my sister:

but she seemed so confused that i decided she must be innocent. and--to be fair--my sister has spent many years of her life talking to grandma just so that i don't have to. it's seriously the most selfless sacrifice i have ever heard of.

next, i blamed my father:

and do you know what he said? this:

he was totally scammed by his own mother! i had managed to keep my phone number from her from years, but suddenly--thanks to dad--all of that hard work was down the drain. even worse, she sounded SO HAPPY on her message that i had to call her back. i braced myself and picked up the phone. i dialed her number...

and she didn't answer! i get the credit of calling without having to talk to her! yeah!

Warm and Bould

today, i'm in boulder. this wouldn't normally constitute good luck in the wintertime, but for some reason, it's significantly warmer in the mountains than in new york city:

so while my metropolitan chums are losing pieces of their faces from frostbite:

i was actually able to walk to work breathing fresh, crisp (but not uncomfortable) colorado air:

maybe i'll stay here forever!

Hairless Joe Jackson

over a year ago, i started the process of systematically removing as much hair from my body as possible:

i had a few sessions of laser hair removal on my legs, and it went just fine every time. then i had super bad luck: the last time i went in, my legs started feeling very tingly directly after. all night, it got more and more painful. i used a topical analgesic, but by the next morning they looked sorta like this:

gross, right? i know! weeks later, and it wasn't getting much better. i went through this truly terrible stage of healing where the scabs were all itchy and it was intolerable. i had to cut a walk in the park short because i needed to go home, take my pants off and claw at my scabby skin.

when they finally "healed" my legs looked like this:

so i went to a dermatologist. first, he gasped. then, he took pictures. then, he told me to look on the bright side, at the good luck in all of this: i could easily go to a costume party as some sort of tiger or striped cat:

thanks, doc! 

anyway, it's still looking pretty awful, and i've been worried about anyone seeing my legs ever again and asking me why they are all strange looking:

so, i decided to go tanning. it was...weird. the room i was escorted to had what looked suspiciously like a punched in hole in the door:

on the opposite side, there was a patched over hole in the wall:

but i decided i didn't need to know what the hell was going on. i hopped into the bed, and went at it:

for ten entire minutes! i went back several times, and though my legs are still stripey, at least now i'm one of those people who go tanning, which is some sort of thing:

besides, if the stripes never go away, i can turn myself into one of those cat people from the hunger games series:

Chocolate chocolate cake

i actually meant to put this on the food blog that my sister and i have, but come to think of it, chocolate chocolate cake is SUPER GOOD LUCK!!

yay, sugar!

Old Man Baby

normally i am too self-absorbed to talk about other people's luck, but today i'm going to make an exception. that is because this week, i am visiting this guy:

 and he is SO CUTE. and--here's the lucky part--he is SUCH a good baby! he's really mellow, hardly cries, entertains himself and likes to be held. his parents don't even know how lucky they are. the bastards....

but--like so many parents before them--the harsh reality of how much work a baby is has set in. turns out, you don't actually know what they want ever, and it can seem as though there are five of them instead of just the one:

which is why it seems almost necessary to have at least one extra person around to help out. enter, ME! (we all knew it would come back to me eventually, right?) unfortunately for said parents, i'm going home today. good luck with the next 18 years! erin out.

Your Fly is Down....

today i write about one of those things that at first glance seems like good luck, but later we find out it wasn't at all. yes, i'm of course talking about no pants day:

just like homer, my pants have been chafing me all day, so it was great to find out I could ditch them entirely:

but, alas, i am not in new york, i'm in missouri where there is nary a subway car to ride pants-less in. also, it is SUPER COLD here, and even though i'm as lovely and fattened up as a spring lamb:

i am also super wimpy and could not withstand much cold. I hope it was fun for those brave new yorkers!

Dream Post 1

last night i had such interesting lucks happen in my dreams that i decided to create a new series for good and bad lucks that happen in the dream world. i'm not going to count these in the luck counter, but i will still color code them, since none of you are that bright... .

the good! tim robbins looking like ian "ray" raymond from high fidelity (only in a gray prison jumpsuit and with dreadlocks rather than the steven seagal ponytail) sacrificed himself so that the cast of community and i wouldn't have to go back to prison:

the bad! if a person never took his or her shoes off for long enough, then it meant that s/he was a llama:

Wheel of Fortune

this morning, i was out walking charlie as per usual. she was sniff, sniffing about, pretending she has a sense of smell (she doesn't, she's a sight hound):

when lo and behold! i spotted something shiny. could it be...? YES:

a shiny quarter! who says the economy is in trouble. i found a quarter! do you know what you can buy for a quarter?! so many things!

one buffalo chicken wing:

a gumball:

one paperback book from goodwill:

or--if one were so inclined--a tootsie roll pop:

not that we would EVER buy a tootsie roll pop after what that company did to us....at any rate, i'm practically a millionaire now, so i'm going to contemplate my fortunes and leave you to your poverty. ta-ta! (<-- that's what rich people say.)

House Warmed, Finger Cut

good luck, everyone! charlie, c.b. and i:

had some folks over this weekend, and we didn't have any spills or ruined anything!

i know, i know, we're all adults, so it seems like we might be past ruining other people's belongings, but i've found that one is never actually past this. at any rate, my stuff successfully made it through the day.

unfortunately, today i was opening a new toy for charles, and the box cut through the side of my fingernail:

what the what? the side of a fingernail? what does that? anyway, now i'm bleeding all over the keyboard, so i'll just close with this picture of a flying squirrel (the toy for charlie is a squirrel toy):

Secular Rosh Hashanah

today is a new day. it's also a new year, it turns out:

the first meal of this first year turned out to be a lucky one! i went to brunch at cronin and phelan with my sister, her boyfriend, and c.b. we chose there because we were told they were serving brunch, and they have this amazingly delicious french toast:

but when we got there, they were only serving a limited brunch menu--a menu that didn't include french toast! but erin, you may say. you said this was a lucky meal. i did, i did, and here's the lucky part:

our waitress asked the chefs if they'd make us some, and they said yes! we got our sweet, greasy, delicious french toast! sister and i both ordered it separately and each ate exactly half of what we were served. started out the new year wasteful:

happy new year!