Lawyerish: You May Already Be a Winner!

(OhmyGOD you guys, I typed up this whole witty entry replete with photos about choosing a contest winner, and then something DIED on me and it's gone, GONE! So I shall try to recreate it as best I can, but mostly I am resisting the urge to throw this craptastic laptop out the window into the pouring rain.)

SO! Thank you all for your great comments/contest entries. I loved reading every one of them. And I'm already starting to think that we should compile additional "Meant to Be" volumes about everything from love to loss to pets to finding one's place in the world. Hmm...

I selected a winner using a highly technical process: writing the entrants' names on little pieces of notebook paper, placing them in a bowl (a Nambe bowl that we got as a wedding present, and that contained about a pound of dust before I cleaned it out to use for the drawing -- it's pretty and looks lovely on our shelf, but receives very little actual use), stirring the names around and pulling one out with my eyes closed.

Here's the bowl, for those wanting to evaluate the standards and practices of this highly technical procedure:

(I got a little nervous as I prepared to draw a name -- would the non-winners be upset with me? Would someone attack my methodology? Would I end up REVILED AND ALONE? -- this is what it's like to be me.)

And the name I pulled out is: LawMommy! You're a winner! And here is your fabulous prize:

As I stood in my kitchen taking pictures, I realized that the wall behind our table was filthy. It looked as though someone had sprayed molasses all over it. I can't imagine how it got so dirty since we hardly ever eat in the kitchen other than for breakfast (for dinner, we hunch over the coffee table, like all people of great couth), and we have no molasses in the house. So I took a moment to wipe it down and ponder this turn of events.

THEN I decided, very on the spur of the moment, to choose another winner. (I know! So spontaneous!). Aaaaaaand...Tara, congrats! Here's YOUR fabulous prize:

Hooray for both of you. Please email me your mailing addresses (Lawyerish at Gmail) and I'll get those little packages right off to you. Thanks everyone for entering!