#NotWinning

My life has been comical lately. Like, ironic comical.

Take this week, for instance. Earlier this week I got a phone call that I won a prize through a contest I entered a couple of months ago.

Sweet. A prize! Maybe something positive is finally happening to me. Maybe my luck is turning around!

Fast forward to today, when I sat, er, stood through an almost hour-long ordeal involving a radio station celebrating its birthday.

There's nothing wrong with that. It's cool they gave out prizes, cake, and goodies to people. Kudos to them. Being in business that long is something to celebrate.

But I'm not really a fan of standing in a room of more than 60 people for an hour and socializing. It was my own personal nightmare. I wanted to turn around and introvert my way out of the building, back into my car and go home.

But I'm no quitter, so I stood through the unnecessary stuff in order to get my prize.

When the chanting and singing was over (I wish I was kidding), they finally handed us our gift bags and told us we could open them.

I was excited. What was in the bag? It could have been something cool - a queen size mattress (I don't have a spare bed, so that would have been cool), a golf cart (I don't really need a golf cart), free pizza for a year (lactose intolerant, here, that would have been a stupid prize) - but it wasn't.

I opened my prize to discover it was a six-month free family membership to a local gym. That in itself is a sweet deal, because that's worth quite a bit of money.

Here's the kicker, though. The fine print of the certificate said it's only valid for new members. And I'm a stickler for following the fine print in life.

I've been a member of this gym for nearly a year now. And technically, this is the third free membership I've won through this gym that's totally useless to me.

Folks, you read that right. I won a prize for something I can't use. The irony is great, here. I mean, it takes some serious talent to win a useless prize. My luck isn't changing one bit...but at least it makes a good story.

"Monica, what did you do today?"

"Oh, you know. I won a non-prize."

I hope everyone who reads this had a more productive Saturday morning then I did.