the silly little things that make you happy

[Listener]

What are some of the silly little things that make you happy?

I just thought of one as I ate my lunch:

Digging through the top part of a "Fruit on the Bottom" yogurt to find the concentrated fruity goodness beneath, and eating that without mixing the yogurt.  Mmm.

[jrderego]

Some of the little things -

Hearing my dad's voice on the phone say, "Hey-lo!" after five rings. I call him every Thursday. He's not old, but he is sick. Handing the phone to my two year old daughter and hearing her say "Hi Baboo! I love you Baboo! I come down for picnic with you soon!"

Pre-work smooches from Cindy.

Watching Godzilla movies with my son and Curious George cartoons with my daughter.

Putting a new print cartridge into my ancient Epson 670 and not having to perform "mechanical ink jet printer voodoo" on it to make it print nice and clean in black and white.

That hasn't happened in a while though...

[Thaurismunths]

My girlfriend's 'happy butt wiggle'. It definitely falls in to the 'cute' rather than 'sexy' kind of wiggle, but it always make me smile.

Seeing the lights turn on after watching someone pass me, and the un-marked cop ahead of me, at a totally unreasonable rate of speed.

Waking up in a panic thinking I'm running late for work/class, only to remember that it's the weekend.

[BrandtPileggi]

Oh man! I was just talking to my girl about this.

Having a toaster. (rather than trying to toast bread in the oven)

Watermelon. It totally made my entire weekend last week

Finally... FINALLY having a car where I'm not trying to, every day, diagnose what's wrong with it, and what will ultimately be the reason for it's demise (always in about a month)

Having $15, standing at a movie bin that has, The Beach, The aviator and Knight's tale for $5 a piece

Then seeing Boiler Room and Resevoir Dogs in the same bin and my GF saying, "Hey! I go $10!" (yes, not the best movies but they hit a chord for me for some reason)

Paying my bills. ALL of my bills. ON TIME even!

Waking up at 7am on a weekend and not being able to get back to sleep. You see, because if i can't go back to sleep, then I HAVE to go for a walk around a lovely park, play basketball and enjoy a beautiful day.

Taking a shower at the gym at the end of a day and good workout. I can stay in there for HOURS if I want. No bitching. No crazy water bills. (Sorry, I conserve everywhere else but I'm a sucker for running hot water!)

Running Hot water!

[wherethewild]

A fresh, hot cup of really strong tea.

Seeing my dog stretched out asleep.

Driving around the Siegessäule at night.

Watching my niece try and eat the webcam while skyping with my sister.

Getting in the car knowing that tonight, where ever I may end up, it´s going to be somewhere I´ve never been before.

Re-organising my bookshelves.

Playing the Settler from Catan card game.

[Russell Nash]

Driving around the Siegessäule at night.

It's a cool monument.  The problem is that when you're actually driving around it, is the hardest angle to see it.

Playing the Settler from Catan card game.

Kicking game.  We're playing that tonight.

[Listener]

Playing the Settler from Catan card game.

Kicking game.  We're playing that tonight.

Penny Arcade's take on the Catan video game.

[Planish]

When something goes wrong at work (technician at short wave transmitter site) and as we stand around scratching our heads to figure it out what the particular combination of symptoms means, I remember some obscure little thing that can fix it in two minutes instead of having to take the transmitter out of service all day to rip it apart. High fives all around.

Pheasants walking across my lawn on their way to wherever.

That my sons cannot come up with what one of them calls "music to hate your parents by" because my taste in music is more outlandish than theirs. We often ask to borrow each others' CDs. One of them introduced me to "Nine Inch Nails", I introduced him to "Chirgilchin" - a Tuvan throat-singing group.

[Chodon]

Accomplishing home repairs without burning the house down is a big one. 
Being able to solve a 20 year old problem at work is a close second.  The old timers said "yeah, the last engineers couldn't fix that, what makes you think you can do it?" then I fix it.  It's rare and time-consuming, but damn it's awesome.