Financial Crisis

We needed a new game.
Our Dot Com Edition Monopoly was fun, sure, and buying websites which no longer exist for millions and millions of Monopoly dollars sounds awesome.
After a while, though, the I.T. guy playing Dot Com Monopoly can get a little despondent. Things aren't like they were.
I've got to buy my own espresso at work, now.
Espresso, which is necessary for my productivity and sanity, is no longer covered by my employers.
The problems are different with regular Monopoly.
Our daughter spends her first trip around the board buying up every property and then running out of cash.
Her attempts to write $5000 on Post-It notes were cute once, but over time it has de-valued our legitimate Monopoly money.
I tried telling her that this is how our country got into its current dire financial situation. "It's only a game" and "calm down" and "stop taking it so seriously" will only soothe me for so long.
When the Community Chest says you have to pay $200 and you only have $11 there is a serious problem which cannot be ignored.
I tried to illustrate this a little better by going around the cul-de-sac borrowing the neighbor's Monopoly money.
It isn't ours, but it is legitimate currency.
I explained to Gwynyth that the neighbors were like China (who are saving our asses, in my opinion, even though they possibly cheat at the Olympics) and that we'd only need to return their money and the money from another couple of dozen Monopoly sets in order to work ourselves out of this financial shell game she'd started.
And I docked her allowance.
But the situation was extreme, and I was The Bank.
In order to teach Gwynyth about inflation and frugality, it was necessary to halt all $200 pay-outs for passing Go and raise rents on Board Walk, Park Place, and Kentucky Avenue and increase the fares on all railroads by 25% with proceeds going to replenish the waning funds available for players to purchase houses and hotels in an attempt to revitalize the Monopoly economy.
For some reason, this made things less fun for the rest of the family.
Shana suggested that we just hand out some more cash from the bank and resume play. The suggestion, in front of our child, that we redistribute wealth, was enough to make me almost too nauseous to repossess the titles to Oriental and Marvin Gardens. But the auction of those properties provided just the financial shot in the arm the game needed, in my opinion.
Anyway, the point is, I picked up a copy of ZOMBIES!!!
Nothing can cheer up a financially devastated populace like a good, solid, end-of-the-world, horror board game.
Gwynyth will be old enough to play it in three years.
Until then, I guess I have to just get used to her little pewter scottie dog urinating all over our economy.