When I cracked open my fortune cookie and found those words waiting for me, it was like the ghost of Confucius whispering in my ear, telling me my life had become routine, a boring, never-ending series of deadlines, bar brawls and late evenings stuffing my face with little yellow marshmallow chicks.

So when a friend called and invited me to a girls' weekend in Austin, I was psyched. Time to whip out the Ouija board, baby blue eye shadow and crimping iron. At least, that's what we did in 1987 at sleepovers (along with sticking someone's underwear in the freezer and hand in a bowl of warm water).

I could tell we were destined to have this experience. For example, on St. Patrick's Day, someone - I assume a drunken leprechaun - plowed his pot of gold into my parked car and landed it in the body shop all week.

Also, I found a travel-sized tube of toothpaste under my bed, and my iTunes shuffle had three songs in a row with the words "trip," "drive" or "girl" in them.

A few days later, we arrived at that beautiful vacation house and properly toasted Lake Austin with lime and Corona. A whole case of them, actually.

Which led me to the realization that there is something way more fun than summoning dead spirits or playing with each other's hair: drunken charades! Why didn't I know about that in fourth grade?! I guess I'm glad the bruising from my demonstrations of the words "flip" and "doormat" are fading, though. That kinda hurt.

The rest of the weekend is a blur of Mexican food, laughter and Scrabble-related word frenzies. It was just what I needed to get the wind in my hair and the Peeps off my brain.

Leaving was sorrowful, but we prepared ourselves for the world of boys by sitting in a circle and chanting the wise words of Confucius: "Circle, circle, dot, dot; now you have a cootie shot."

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