This one is going to inspire you.

Some of you have been whining like a bunch of little girls that it's time for me to get back to blogging. Point taken. While it was only fair that I got to take a little break while I was mired in the all-consuming misery of pregnancy, and then a continued break when I first brought home my bouncing bundle of screaming, pooping joy, you make a good point: Enough is enough. It's time for me to stop thinking of myself and start thinking more of you, my friends inside the computer.

So here I am, and I'm ready to get back to telling you all the exciting details of my life. To that end: I've decided that this new baby we have in the house should be my inspiration for turning over a new leaf. Yes, the old me was pretty fabulous, that's true...but it's funny how a new baby, so fresh and innocent and uncorrupted, can make a person contemplate the flaws in their own life, and want to strive for something better, something cleaner. So please see below my 5-point plan for emerging as The New Me:

1) No more drinking first thing in the morning. I generally get up with the baby at 6:30 or 7 AM, so my day starts early--but in the interest of restraint I will patiently watch the clock until 7:45 before I start mainlining straight vodka.

2) No more shoplifting cigarettes and then selling them to grade school children for a 300% markup. I always knew that was the wrong thing to do, but I did it anyway, and I'm ashamed of that now. From here on out, I will cut the kiddies a break and only mark the smokes up by 200%. That will cut down on the amount of money they have to steal from their mothers' purses, so everyone's karma improves. I'm feeling pretty good about this one.

3) No more picking up and killing hitchhikers just for the sport of it. I can't promise I won't kill a hitchhiker here and there (that would be like promising I won't eat or sleep ever again!) but from now on when I do it, it will be for more philanthropic reasons, like to spare them from a life of impurity, or to make the world a better-smelling place.

4) No more mocking the elderly. I want to free up more time for mocking the disabled, the poor, and the abused. I really think I've gone as far as I can go in terms of mocking the elderly, anyway, so this one is a no-brainer.

5) No more wasting all my time by spending it with my children and husband. From here on out, I pledge to devote way more time to surfing the internet for porn, cruising internet sex chat rooms, and of course, blogging. I will allot what I think is a very fair and reasonable amount of time each day--exactly 15 minutes--to family, and the rest belongs to the internet. I've had the foresight to purchase a small egg timer to make sure I don't accidentally go beyond the 15 minute mark.

So there you have it, and I think this proves that I'm the kind of person who is always meticulously striving toward self-improvement. You guys could stand to exhibit a little of that perfectionism yourselves. It's not too late: You, too, can change.