"In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes." Benjamin Franklin

Ok, she's back! let me give you a rundown of the week that was. I spent several days at the mothership in Ghetto Park. It was a very good time, very restful, but also very productive.

My dad helped me with my taxes(more on that in a sec), and my mom helped me with my editing projects. I helped one of my brothers with his resume and dispensed career advice to the other one. Our family is like a small corporation, we're all constantly at work for each other.

I work very hard. I don't, however, earn a lot of money. I pay it all to the government. Sorry, I'm a little embittered by the tax bill I received this week. Why do I even bother to try to earn money when I have to give it all to the leviathan in the end?

oh well.

I was reading through ways to get tax deductions and I think adopting a child would be a good option for me. I'm thinking one that's a little older, maybe 15 or 16, so they can more or less take care of themselves. I wouldn't have to do any "child rearing," I could just deduct them from my taxes.

This afternoon I had a wonderful time with my church friends. I had 10 of them over to my house. Our church has a pretty big group of 20 and 30somethings and we usually take turns going to each other's houses each Sunday.

I made a big pot of Brazilian black bean soup and bought some yummy whole grain bread at the local Russian market. one guy brought salad. someone else brought dessert, and I had also bought a princess cake at Ikea. that went over really well. I mean really well. I'd had princess cake so often that I'd kind of forgotten how unspeakably delicious it is.

a princess with a princess cake

I introduced my friends to "Loaded Questions" - a board game that I LOVE which should be very familiar to my Wallace PCA readers. Everyone has to answer a question about themselves and then one person has to guess which person gave which answer. the group got really into it, very competitive.

Question: "if you could be dictator of any place, where would it be?" there were answers like Krypton and the city of Maastricht (In case you hadn't guessed, the latter answer was mine. Man, I would love to enslave the populace of that place! )

Question:"What one word describes your relationship to to the Internet?" there were answers like "addiction" and "youtube."

so anyway, lots of fun and laughing and good food. and, what's more, lots of nice people to help me clean up the kitchen afterward! yay!

so right now I'm just chilling out on my couch, drinking some tea, admiring my clean kitchen, and plotting the week to come (in which I will once again engage in the pointless pursuit of financial gain. ) oh well, what was it Aristotle said? "Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods." On days like today, I understand what he means.