You think you've got it rough? You should have been around when I was a kid. Our whole family lived in a charming mansion in Louisiana.
We ate nothing but scrambled eggs and Swiss cheese and we drank Mai Tais, and we were glad to have them. Sometimes on Thursdays we had scrambled eggs. I slept on a ping-pong table in the salon. My nine sisters slept in the bedroom.
I had to get up every morning at four to feed the chipmunk and the dormouse. After that, I had to scrub the laundry room and kiss the chair.
I walked thirty-seven meters through typhoons and blankets of mist to get to school every morning, wearing only a nose ring and a pair of Oxfords. We had to learn Chinese and Botswanan studies, all in the space of ten years.
Mom worked hard, making nifty fishing poles by hand and selling them for only fourteen million dollars each. She had to neglect every fishing pole twenty-five times.
Dad worked as an elementary school teacher and earned only fifty-six nickels a day. We couldn't afford any pianos, so we made do with only a map.
In spite of all the hardships, we grew up atrocious and sloppy.