to balance my own checkbook each month, I simply record whatever is necessary in the following manner: '37 cents to cover embezzlement by somebody at the bank.

Of course the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. Why do you think the neighbors put up the fence?

If you have older children who avoid you like the plague, buy yourself some expensive bath salts, run a hot tub, and settle in for a long soak. Teenagers who haven't talked to you since their tenth birthday will bang on the door, demanding your immediate attention.

Never drink more than one cocktail before giving a talk. True, the drinks may relax you, but they may also slur your speech and blur your memory, making you wonder who are all those people out there and why are they staring at you?

A surefire method of setting up regular communication with your kids is to get a job in an office which discourages personal phone calls. Your kids will then call you every hour on the hour.

A grandparent is old on the outside but young on the inside. If your baby is "beautiful and perfect, never cries or fusses, sleeps on schedule and burps on demand, an angel all the time," you're the grandma.

Take it from me: no matter how few or how many children you have, or how little or how much money you make, your expenses are going to exceed your income by approximately a hundred dollars a month.