Maria's Happy Rules

1. Chipotle at least once a week; twice is never too much; three may often be warranted.
2. Do not look at your credit card statement more than twice a month.
3. Do not read blogs/click on pins/read tweets related to WEIGHT and GET FIT and LOVE YOUR SCALE and BIKINI BODY and YOU WILL BE BETTER IF YOU ARE THIS AND NOT THAT
4. Do not check MSNBC "out of curiosity, haha those lunatics."
5. Orange Juice.
6. At least one day a week, get up early enough to take a shower and then get BACK INTO BED for at least 15 minutes.
7. Answer phone with "you've got Maria" as often as you feel led.
8. More Sienfeld.
9. Throw the tennis ball around in the backyard with your dog.
10. Find a child. Earn a hug from said child. Soak up the child hug.
11. "Power of Love" by Celine Dion; volume equal to but not less than 15.
12. Do not try on your bathing suit during the winter months
13. More peanut butter; more spoons.
14. Remember: you are always planning a trip. There is always a trip in the future. Current possible targets to research heavily and often, especially in "google images" mode: Thailand, Santorini, Mallorca, Jersalem, Easter Island.
15. When at restaurants, look at the menu and say to yourself "I shall get what I would like" and then do that.
16. Watch "Say  Yes to the Dress" to feel grateful for your family that cried for every single dress you put on.
17. Read old journals to giggle.
18. Everyone who hurt your feelings in the past did it because they were secretly madly in love with you.
19. Look at Aaron. That dude married you. Check that out.
20. Pray. Believe He's listening.

I totally love Bob Harper. He is just gorgeous and he loves people and he's smart and funny and I like his weird clothes. I follow him on Twitter OBVI (omg, obvi) and yesterday I saw some link to his "skinny rules" (he has a book out by that name, apparently. And again - one must not question my love for Bob (and his dog Karl! KARL FOR A DOG'S NAME be still my soul!) - but his "skinny rules" were total bullshit. First of all, 'skinny' is a terrible word; I would have accepted "fit" and we could've discussed my problem with 'rules' another time, but 'skinny'? BOB.

And then as I was reading the rules and  chastising myself for not following them already and simultaneously making grand plans to begin following them right now right this minute I NEED SOME BLUEBERRIES STAT, I though, people would think I'm absolutely bonkers if I started doing these. Seriously, how roll-your-eyes annoyed would you be if I was constantly like "omg ya'll I can't go out to eat tonight or tomorrow or yesterday or right now because I need a glass of water first and I can't have carbs after lunch and I haven't eaten a raspberry today and I wasn't quite hungry went I went to bed last night." I mean seriously, that is complete bullshit! Maybe if I was overweight you'd be like "Girl! You go! Good for you!" but if I were a friend who was not, you'd be like "what a high-maintenance bitch." That double-standard is also bullshit, because we shouldn't discriminate against bullshit. Bullshit isn't ok if I'm fat. Bullshit is always bullshit and no one should live their life according to a list of bullshit rules that warrants constant second guesses to perform even the most mundane of social interactions.