Five Things that Don't Suck, Annual Mystery Edition

1. cake
2. presents
3. candles
4. cards
5. suits

Five Things that Don't Suck, Fake Book Titles* Edition

1. Uncooperative Bangs
2. Grade-A Plonk
3. Jellybean Ball Pit
4. Guest Star in the Dreams of Strangers
5. Whatever Crimes I May Have Committed, I Certainly Didn't Forget To Post This List This Morning Before I Left The House

*don't go stealing these, though, because I have dibs

Bonus: Three Poets Who Don't Suck, Pittsburgh Edition

Friends, one week from tonight, I'll be reading at Classic Lines in Pittsburgh. I'll be there with Krista Cox and Jen Stein Hauptmann (sometimes a.k.a. Jen Stein) at 7 p.m. You come, too. It's free! It's fun! It's me and some other cool poets you can hug in person!*

Classic Lines
5825 Forbes Blvd.
Pittsburgh, PA

*Please do not hug the poets without permission.

Five Things that Don't Suck, Vagaries of Joy Edition

1. being able to do some good in the world
2. people who allow you to do it
3. those rare times when you can make someone happy by your mere presence
4. full hearts
5. smiling for no apparent reason

Five Things that Don't Suck, Hot and Muggy Edition

1. the many, many ways in which it is not February
2. waking up to a house where everything feels vaguely damp from humidity and thinking, "I am so glad it's not still February"*
3. the ten-day forecast, which might as well just say, "NOT FEBRUARY"
4. the complete lack of snow on the ground here
5. not needing a sweater

*true story

Five Things that Don't Suck, Clancy and Julie Edition

1. Clancy
2. Julie
3. seeing Clancy and Julie
4. car rides with Julie to see Clancy
5. french fries*

*theoretical. But I bet there will be french fries.

Five Things that Don't Suck, Poet Problems Edition

1. waking up with a poem in your head
2. hanging onto it while you pee and get dressed
3. hanging onto it while you walk the dogs
4. when someone doesn't drive by you with "Blurred Lines" blasting out their open windows*
5. holding onto that poem all the way through your morning routine and writing it down before it gets away, thus giving the world just a little more beauty**

*theoretical. Very, very theoretical.

Five Things that Don't Suck, Secret-Keeping Edition

1. being able to keep secrets*
2. being excited about the aforementioned secrets
3. the word "aforementioned"
4. assuming the secrets involve gifts of some sort, pulling out those gifts on a regular basis and chortling gleefully over them
5. also perhaps doing a small amount of self-satisfied clapping

*theoretical