the kind of person who leans toward the whole Cheez-It thing . To begin with , I have a slight tendency toward depression -LRB- think Sylvia Plath listening to a freshly downloaded acoustic set from Leonard Cohen -RRB- . And when this particular brain chemistry is confronted with the incredibly unsettling knowledge that people no longer work like dogs to get ahead , they work like dogs just to stay where they are , well , a girl starts needing a few good reasons to get up , put on a little lipstick , and venture out . But it 's no secret that it 's not pretty out there . Food prices are soaring , the housing market is plummeting , the middle class is disappearing , the climate is changing , and Madonna is touring . This is all the more reason to keep a soothing thought or two close at hand . Someday soon , I promise , we can sit down together and come up with a breathtaking bucket list that finally commits us to skydiving with Morgan Freeman just as we 've secretly prayed we would , but today I 'm offering a different kind
-LRB- OPRAH.com -RRB- -- It 's probably good that I 'm not rich . Money , it seems to me , sends people in one of three directions : Lisa Kogan cites the increase in intelligent , witty , creative women as a reason she can be cheerful . It accelerates an innate inclination to be generous , or it accelerates a kamikaze inclination to party with the Olsen twins , or it sucks away your sense of purpose and produces a desperate need to eat nothing but those little white cheddar Cheez-It crackers while staring blankly at an endless cycle of `` Will & Grace '' reruns . I like to think that if I were rich , I 'd be the kind of person who looks at the world and decides to fund cancer research and build schools and feed the hungry , and save whoever needs saving , but there 's an excellent chance I 'd be the kind of person who looks at the world and decides never to get out of bed again . In fact , despite my very real -LRB- and utterly inconvenient -RRB- need to earn a living , I 'm still