(No, it's not just you. I can't believe I just typed that either.)

I drive a pretty big car -- A Honda Pilot.

(OK, I guess it's an SUV.)

I hate driving big cars. I hate parking them. I hate filling them up with gas. However, I have a growing family -- one with a car-pooling preschooler, a cute toddler, and that will soon include a third child who needs to be in a car seat. Did I mention that we're tall people? We are. As much as I hate to admit it, I need a bigger car.

At this stage of the game, I'm left with limited options. I could buy a crossover (with captain's chairs in the middle row so that we can actually reach the third row) or I could buy a minivan.

Just writing that makes me want to grab a gin martini and play some Nina Simone, but I can't do that because I'm pregnant. So I sit here on a Boppy (for the sciatica) sipping my mango juice and humming "Mysterious" by The Backyardigans, writing about how I'm too hip for a minivan, and yes, I do get the irony of the whole thing.

Anyways.

The only crossovers we could find were made by Chevy, GMC, and Buick. Notice a trend? Yes! They're all by General Motors! The company that's bankrupt for making unreliable cars? I've always bought boring old Japanese cars, and I can honestly tell you that the only times I see a mechanic is when I take the cars in for oil changes -- every couple of years or so. (Shh!) I have no desire to start a relationship with a mechanic a this stage in my life, but because I have an open mind, we went to GM dealers to check the cars out.

Have you been inside a car dealership lately? It's very, very depressing.

However! The scruffy Chevy salesman still had the balls to tell me that the Chevy Traverse is a great "girl car" AND then he took my husband out back for a little talk, about what, I don't know. Probably about how "girls" aren't welcome at Chevy dealers? And, hey! Let's take a look at our shiny Camaros? My husband kept looking back at me nervously, because he knew I was pissed AND he knew that it was over. Because I'm a mean "girl."

Despite all of this, we went to a GMC/Buick dealer. The Buick Enclave is a pretty nice looking car. The GMC Acadia is exactly the same, but a little less attractive. I asked the salesman which one of the two models would survive GM's reorganization.

He didn't know.

I asked him if the Enclave came in Diamond White.

He said that all he has is the one they had in stock, take it or leave it.

I snorted.

He said he was serious, because the factories were shutting down for the summer.

And that was the end of that.

So! Off we went to minivan-land. I live in New England, so I have to have 4WD or I will not leave the house for six months. That leaves one choice: The Toyota Sienna.

We go to the "largest Toyota dealer in New England!" and tell them we want to test drive a Sienna.

He tells us we're out of luck.

Turns out, there's a waiting list to even buy a minivan. They're sold out until the fall. Let me repeat: MINIVANS ARE THE HOTTEST VEHICLE OUT THERE. You can wave all the cash you want in their faces, and they can't sell you one.

So I can't have one. And of course, that means that now I really want one. The sliding doors! The remote entry! The storage!

What has happened to me? Help me.

I know of people who are inspired by rainy days. I'm not one of those people. It's been raining non-stop since...I can't even remember, and it doesn't seem like it will let up anytime soon...so I quite literally have nothing to say.

No, really. I'm not kidding. Talk to you later...when the sun's out.

So of course most of us are nothing more than a (patented) ear of fake corn.

I can't wait to see Food, Inc -- even if I'm incapable of watching a movie in the theater without eating fistfuls of popcorn and Milk Duds. You know, together. It's caramel-popcorn-chocolate nirvana.

However, I do believe in honest food labeling. I hate "food products" even if I will eat them if I have to. Call me an elitist if you want, but I think McDonald's is a sad substitute for a backyard burger with fresh tomatoes and lettuce. It simply doesn't compare. So this is the most excited I've been about a movie in ages. I just hope my fellow foodies don't mind my Milk-Dud-and-popcorn habit.

"Papas work and Mamas don't."

My husband and I stop eating and look, surprised, at our son.  He was already happily back to eating his breakfast cereal. We, on the other hand, were stunned, and not just because he had been chattering away about spiders just a minute ago.

(Ah, the non-sequitur. That's just how it goes with a four year-old in the house.)

"I'll have you know that your Mama is a lot smarter than I am, " was all that my husband could come up with. I couldn't thing of anything to say. And I'm supposed to be the smart one. But I knew that's not what our son meant, though I'm well aware that to many people paying work and brains are one and the same.

Instead, I thought about the day ahead of us: The driving, the cooking, the endless negotiating. I thought about the nice air-conditioned offices where I have worked in the past - places with doors and windows that look out at planes, planes that I used to take to to go to Very Important Meetings. I remember the thrill of a job well done - and the bonus checks that felt much better than any pat in the back ever did. I thought about my diploma collection - high school, college, grad school - the last one obscenely large in size and filled with beautiful calligraphy (which I've never bothered to decipher because it's in Latin. Once again, genius.). I realize that right now, no one cares.

Then I remembered.

I remembered what it was really like for me. I remembered working with my last boss, God bless her incompetent heart. The jealousy in her voice when I quit because I didn't want to be a brand manager anymore. I remembered the rows of cubicles and the persistent hum of the printers, white noise that would make me zone out - and what did I daydream about when I was half-awake and half asleep in front of an Excel spreadsheet?

Escape.

I remember that I chose this life of uncertainty. I wanted to write. I wanted more control of my days. I've found that that's a lot harder than being told what to do. Have I wasted my education, my work experience? I don't know. But if there's one thing I know is that the person who should benefit the most from all my hard work is me. And I think I have: If anything, I have the confidence to say no to projects, things and people that don't fit me. I like that.

But enough about that. My kids and husband are still looking at me. Are they waiting for an answer?

"It's a little more complicated than that," I tell my son. I rub his hair and smile. He smiles back and asks if he can wear his spider tee to school again, the one he wore yesterday.

"Sure. Why not?" One decision down. Another endless day is ahead.