Eliana Osborn

Look, Connect Four is not a good game. But it can be over quickly, which is pretty great.

I’m not alone in being troubled by how people suddenly disappear in life, right? That’s essentially why the internet was created. You may have heard rumors about Al Gore inventing it for military purposes... Lies!

I’m proud of you right now, even with all the sadness. Proud of you for heading to rehab, leaving the kids, the man, the house — all of it — to get on top of things. Doing it instead of just thinking about it, talking about it even, hemming and hawing? That’s pretty badass.

There are some days of parenting that are magical, full of unicorns and four leaf clovers and lottery winnings. Those are the moments when I catch myself, just for a second, feeling content and happy and looking around trying to freeze things. Out of 7000 days, those maybe make up five a year.

My sister Liz is full of wisdom, like my favorite quote I’ve shared with practically everyone I know: “Every pair of underwear has two good sides.”

My Life on the Road (or MLR) is not what I expected...the idea of not waiting for experience to come to you permeates the book.

I’ve got two tales of hideous male behavior — at the elementary school, somewhere typically full of good vibes and happiness and all that.

Kirk Cameron in all his Growing Pains glory was the ideal crush. Unthreatening, goofy, good kid with very reasonable weekly conflicts. And a good smile. Always been a sucker for that.

A new, exciting trend is to have food pantries for college students. I talked to an AmeriCorps volunteer running one of these centers and she was matter-of-fact about the need — and how little is being done. Today’s college students may be young and single, living la vida loca. But more and more are what we call ‘nontraditional’: slightly older, employed full-time (or close to it), supporting a family, a veteran, etc.

Hunger for nontraditional students doesn’t mean surviving on ramen: It means they are not the only person in the household who's in need.

Perfectly Karaoke Or Lip Sync A Song: You may think this is less important than the other items on the list. You are wrong.