I will win EVERYTHING.

So as some of you may or may not know, I love online sweepstakes. I have 20-25 going at any given time that you can enter every day for whatever time period. I also search for one-time entry ones and do maybe 10-15 of those a week. I have been doing this for about a year now. It started with last year's HGTV Green Home. I started to enter that, then found several sites that have pages upon pages of links to sweepstakes. I used to have many more daily entry ones, but I've toned it down.

The sweepstakes range from houses, to $1,000,000.00, to gift cards from various stores, to power tools, to boats. I don't care if I win a lifetime supply of Maxi pads. At least I'll have won something. I, of course, enter any HGTV home giveaways that are going on. The Dream Home, the Green Home, the Urban Oasis, DIY's Blog Cabin Giveaway.... Even if it's somewhere I totally don't want to live, and I know that the taxes on it will be more than I could ever make in a decade. I have. to. win.

Now I'm sure most people enter these kinds of things thinking, "Well, I'm probably not going to win, but hey, someone has to, so why not give it a shot?" But me? I am thoroughly convinced that I will win every time I submit a new entry. You know how many I have won to date? One. And that wasn't even really a sweepstakes, it was a photo contest. I won a sweet $250 pair of shoes, though!

Every time a sweepstakes ends, I get super excited. I am sure that in the ensuing days, I will get an e-mail or phone call or letter or Ed McMahon at my door (or Ed McMahon's corpse... zombie Ed McMahon?) As the days go by and I do not receive any of these things, I get a little sad. I start coming up with reasons why I didn't win.

"I must not have entered correctly. Did I hit the wrong button? Maybe there was a secret 'submit' button that I overlooked and I hit the big, obvious 'submit' button that was actually a decoy."

"Maybe the fates thought that someone else needed to win more. Like, a homeless guy entered and he won the $50 Target gift card so he could buy a new suit and get a job and start a new life."

"I probably didn't win, because the sweepstakes gods have proclaimed that everyone who enters online sweepstakes is only allowed to win one big thing in their lives and I'm meant to win something much better at some point in the future."

When I come up with the right excuse for not winning, I either kick myself for not finding that secret button, or am content with the fact that a homeless man somewhere is no longer homeless, or I'm going to win a bajillion dollars sometime soon.

The latest HGTV Dream Home giveaway is ending in a couple of days. I am fully prepared to win the house in Stowe, Vermont and move there to live happily in the house I will never be able to afford to keep. I have even researched the area, job searched, and thought about who I will take with me to live in my guest room and help pay the taxes and utilities. When the time comes for them to announce someone else as the winner, I will be inconsolable for about 5 minutes, then feel very happy for the crack-addicted prostitute who is moving to Vermont to turn her life around.


P.S. I know my posts have been a little different from the "I hate everything about myself. I need to change right now. I am full of lies and pipe dreams." that I usually post, but I've been reading Allie Brosh's blog and decided to try a more humorous style. I'll still keep everyone updated on my life and personal progress, but I can be funny, too!