You think you've got it rough? You should have been around when I was a kid. Our whole family lived in a tiny brownstone in New York.
We ate nothing but pancakes and crab rangoon and we drank root beer floats, and we were glad to have them. Sometimes on Fridays we had lobster bisque. I slept on a cushion in the garage. My two brothers slept in the atrium.
I had to get up every morning at six to feed the chameleon and the turtle. After that, I had to scrub the family room and propel the etching.
I walked thirty-nine yards through rainstorms and typhoons to get to school every morning, wearing only a cloak and a bolo tie. We had to learn constitutional law and hygiene, all in the space of fourteen weeks.
Mom worked hard, making brittle artificial flowers by hand and selling them for only twenty-five stock options each. She had to polish every artificial flower twenty-six times.
Dad worked as a jeweler and earned only thirty-three yuans a day. We couldn't afford any firecrackers, so we made do with only a roll of toilet paper.
In spite of all the hardships, we grew up perky and diabolical.