When I am clearly strung out, Doug likes to ask me what would make me happy. It is half rhetorical and half serious. I know he would do anything feasible, but I also know he feels there should be something he can do to change my mood. This morning he asked the question just after the gremlin 2-year-old dropped crystal juggling balls on my foot and an incident involving a dirty diaper that defies description. I know I am responsible for my own mood. However, I have come up with a list of things that would make it easier for me to have a better mood.

1. Not being the person who discovers what Noah has been doing instead of his homework while sitting at his desk in his room.
2. Buying a cart full of groceries.
3. The laundry all caught up instead of an overwhelming mountain of stink.
4. Ben & Jerry’s.
5. One room that is actually clean.
6. Evan getting beyond his fear of the potty.
7. My husband sleeping in the same bed as me at night instead of hopping to and from his computer all night long.
8. New clothes or shoes (I won’t hold my breath).
9. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert 5 night a week instead of 4.
10. The person whose first name sounds like a breakfast juice going far, far away. And staying there.
11. And taking the hairless, underwearless, do nothing celebritarts with him.
12. A good steak. And crab legs.
13. A working iPod to drown out preschool television programs.
14. A bra that fits.

Yes, I know. But he asked.