looking up

Writing a respectable blog post has been impossible lately.  I tried several times, but failed miserably after committing a single thought to a sentence or two.  Life in the deep rut of routine is shitty feedstock for blog post ideas.  Life is easiest in the deep rut of routine, but alas, it’s not very interesting.

Well, I’m writing, so something exciting has happened recently.  In fact, several exciting things have happened.  Until recently, I used to think I was one of most unlucky people who walked the planet.  Truly, I could not even win a coin toss.  This was demonstrated to me time and again throughout my life.  It was not so much a matter of bad luck, just no good luck.

About a month ago, I attended a conference for my teaching job.  At the end of the day, they had a drawing for a boatload of door prizes.  By the time they were ready to give away prizes, most people had left.  There were maybe 80-90 people left.  Anyway, they began drawing names and handing out gift bags.  Name after name was called.  People all around me were winning cool stuff and not so great stuff – tee shirts, books, umbrellas, mugs, software, satchels, etc.  After a while, it looked like everyone was going to walk out with something except me.  In fact, all the gift bags were gone and I was only one of a handful of people who had won nothing.  Then they brought out a small bag and announced they would draw for the grand prize.  I won!!!  It was a Kindle Fire HD.  Awesome!!!

This week has almost generated a whole paradigm shift in my feeble brain.  In fact, I’ve had so much good luck that I’m starting to worry.  Surely all this good luck is going to cause something terrible to happen.  No one person is going to have this many good things happen without paying some kind of penalty!

First, I won a $100 gift card (one of three) for completing a survey months ago.  Then, I was notified by ProQuest that they owe me royalties because my dissertation has sold enough copies.  How much?  I still don’t know, but they don’t cut checks for less than $25. I have a tax form to fill out and return L Next, I learned I was nominated for executive vice-chair for a professional organization I belong to.  Apparently I’m running unopposed, so I’ve pretty much won the election unless “bad luck” kicks in to interfere.   Last night, I learned I was nominated to be included in another honorary (sort of…it seems to be) professional organization.  They are reviewing my credentials and will let me know if I’m inducted. 

All of these things happened in the first three days this week.  I’m just so incredibly lucky lately…maybe I should buy a lottery ticket, or get me to the race track.  Maybe Lady Luck is my new girlfriend.