I’m so glad Sabrina Cognata started writing again. She’s one of my favorites.

Today, I was watching Family Feud because when it is five-million degrees and you are making dinner you want to see totally stupid people say things that make you cringe.

And because I like to shout at the TV.

So in the finals, they ask, “What’s the number one gift that women like to receive?”  The man answering says, “Flowers,” and I think to myself, “What an idiot.”

Not that I hate flowers, but flowers die.  Sort of like love.  So I guess they are a super appropriate gift in a way.  But I have never really been a flowers girl.  I think I am more of a balloon person.

Balloons are awesome cause they just sort of hang around and look pathetic and deflated in a corner of your room after a while or you pop that son of a bitch and startle people.  Or my favorite of all, you just release them and watch them go wherever there fuck they go before they destroy the ozone layer.  I guess balloons are a lot like me, but they are not on my list of things I want as a gift.

Actually, the first three things I thought of were:  Tech Gifts, Shoes & Coffee.

My mother, who was next to me, swore up and down the answer would be jewelry.  I imagined getting some dumb piece of jewelry, a ring or a pair of earrings.  Then I imagined a ring that was actually a laptop.  What do you even do with a giant diamond ring or whatever?  Like what use is it?  Shit, I think I’d rather have a set of golf clubs before I’d want a ring.  Maybe an iPod ring.  That would be cool.  I do not care if I ever get jewelry.

I know this because a former boyfriend once was hinting around, asking what sort of jewelry I liked.  I think he was trying to do that thing where he asked a lot of questions in an attempt to see what sort of ring he should buy to ask me to marry him.

I told him I didn’t really care about that sort of thing, but he could buy me a new iMac.  He was super puzzled by my answer.

“Who doesn’t want jewelry?”

I didn’t even know what to say.  For the price of a decent ring I can get four computers or a metric shit ton of clothes or at least 8 pairs of hyper expensive shoes.  Holy shit, I like shoes.  The following week I broke up with him.  If the person you’re dating doesn’t understand how your brain works and what you like inherently, then you shouldn’t be together.

My mother was wrong.  Jewelry wasn’t the number one answer for me or for the people polled.

Their number one answer was flowers.  My number one answer is power.  But who’s going to give me that?  I just have to take it.