Cookie? Monsters!

I promised myself that I'd document the last month before my trip daily. I thought I'd write about my questions, my keen observations, my profound discoveries. But you know what? Everything I'd write just kept reminding me of that fortune cookie game. You know, the one where you add "in your pants" to the cookie's prediction:

You can be full of surprises ... in your pants.
Silence is golden .. in your pants.

Granted, these truths are self-evident, but I digress ...

*ahem*

Anyway, everything I'd write had the same kind of ring to it:

I ponder the weather ... on the prairie.
I can't wait to make my journey ... on the prairie.

Yuck. Dull. I didn't dare subject my four faithful readers to such crappy prose! Worse yet, it was tiresome to even type. I bored myself. Certainly, I am excited about my trip. I'm nervous, I'm curious. Am I counting the days? You bet.

But the whole thing did make me think about fortune cookies.

I went through a bit of a crisis a few years ago when I kept getting blank slips of paper in fortune cookies. My dining companions would get delightful quips, tidbits of advice, or lucky numbers. Me? Nothing but a little white wisp of paper, completely blank. This happened more than a few times. Now, I'd wager that some people might assume this was a good thing; perhaps the cookie Powers That Be felt I was on the right track and that I needed no shreds of wisdom. However, being the pessimist that I am, I was certain that it was a portent of doom, misery, and plagues by the score.

I tried to rationalize the whole thing. I reminded myself that in all the times I'd gotten a prediction, I had never gotten any kind of concrete, useful advice. My cookies never clued me in to the fact that I was dangerously close to bouncing a check. Hell, they never even had the courtesy to impart such wisdom as "Your fly is unzipped". Frankly, I'd always been the lonely loser of the fortune cookie circuit.

But, indeed, it got worse. One ominous day, I got a fortune cookie with nothing in it. Forget the blank paper angst ... this cookie had no paper at all! Nothing. It was simply a hollow confection. I'd like to say that this was a turning point in my life; that this was the moment I seized the reins of my adulthood. That I achieved full self-actualization. That the scales fell from my eyes and I became a woman of courage and integrity. If I said these things, however, I'd be lying. But I did the next best thing: I avoided fortune cookies for years.

Recently, I returned to the choppy seas of cookie prognostication. I'm glad that I did, because the fortune I got was kind of cool:

Replace your scars with stars.

... on the prairie?
... in your pants?

I'm not sure. But I love the mystery and intrigue. And the challenge!

---------------
Days until trip: 29
Money saved: $215. (Thanks, car! Did those fortune cookies give a heads-up? Nope. Damn cookies.)