Grace In Small Things, 6/365-ish, expanded edition

I was going to take a break from GISTing for a day and complete something I should have done last week. I was tagged by AnyMommy in a recent post to share five of my addictions here. But if I do it right, maybe they can be one in the same.

Aren't addictions generally for things that give us pleasure? And there's grace to be found in pleasure. I suppose there are exceptions to that, but I'm going to give it a try anyway.

1. Books - Anyone who knows me how much I like to read, but I doubt that most of them realize the extent to which I'm addicted to reading. It's the one thing I can count on to really take me away to another place at any time. It's very, very rare that I don't have a book with me and will whip it out whenever I'm left with time on my hands. To that end, having a Kindle has proved to be a godsend. So long as it's charged up, it's like having an entire library at my fingertips.

2. The feel of my cat's fur - From the first time I picked Finn up at the adoption table, I was captivated by the feel of his fur. He's got the lushest fur I've ever felt on a cat and it's so incredibly soothing to stroke him. I'm sure my propensity for doing just that has made him more spoiled than he might otherwise be, but it was by design, in part. When Peri came to live with my mom, she was tiny, scared and traumatized by being dumped off in a parking lot for who-knows-how-long before she was found and my brother brought her home. She never grew out of the scared and she's never been comfortable with being held. Over the years I've persevered and gotten her slightly more used to it, but she still squirms away in a short time. When I adopted Finn, I wanted to make sure that he got accustomed to being held -- that was a real hardship! Thankfully, he was on board with this and enjoys being petted and held pretty much any time, so I can get my daily dose of Finn fur without complaint.

3. Mashed potatoes - While it's a pretty mundane side dish, there's nothing I like better than good mashed potatoes; they're totally my go-to comfort food and I think it's fair to say that I'm addicted to them. I like making them from scratch and have my own method of preparing them that, to me, makes them unbeatable. But I order them at restaurants to compare and usually they come up short. Too cold, too thin, too gluey, too grainy, too peppery, too blecch is the verdict most of the time, but still I keep ordering because the restaurant that does them right will have my undying love. Until then, I'll just make my own whenever I need a comfort dish.

4. Pogo.com - I love playing games and Pogo feeds my addiction. Many nights I can be found there, playing games and collecting tokens. I'm very competitive and there I can go, compete, win and not have to listen to any whining about it. (People may whine, but I can always turn off the chat. And, really, people are mostly congratulatory, not whiny.) I can also play many games against "robots" so I don't even have to concern myself with someone else's reaction. Yes, it's a little anti-social but it works for me. There are so many games to chose from and it's relaxing to play. Each week there are badges to win, which is a fun way to challenge yourself and learn new games.

5. Iced Tea - This is my drink of choice, and one that feeds my need for great quantities of ice. I get tired of carbonated drinks and usually head for the iced tea when it's available. I drink it year-round; I figure if you nutty people can drink hot coffee in the summer, I can drink iced tea in the heart of winter! I love mixing it with lemonade to create an Arnold Palmer, which I'm always surprised to learn many people haven't heard of before. There's nothing like a perfectly sweetened, ice-cold, frosty glass of tea...filled to the brim with ice.

So there you have it, my graceful addictions, laid out for the world to see. I never know who will be in to this kind of thing so I won't tag anyone directly, but if you blog and would like to share your addictions with us, I hope you'll let us know in the comments.