The Game of Life. Actually.

The Game of Life should probably not be played by recent graduates.

I played it tonight with a couple of friends, and I have to say, I got pretty upset about life after university. First of all, I became an accountant. And while there's nothing wrong with accountants, it's definitely not the way I saw my life going. Then, despite allegedly earning a $70,000 salary, it took me ages to start earning any money. Probably because I kept buying Molly's artwork.

Things didn't really get much better after that. I stopped gaining life experience after about 15 minutes, I became obsessed with earning money, I was in what seemed to be a loveless marriage (my plastic figurine didn't seem to have an emotional connection with my husband-character plastic figurine), I never had any children while everyone else managed at least two and the only property I owned was a log cabin near Lake Ketchafishee.

Not only that but Carlo kidnapped one of Molly's grandchildren, Laura developed severe depression as a result of a stagnant career and poverty, and Molly tried to blow up a bridge.

I was getting very upset about the way this game was showing my life turning out.

We stuck with it though - through the poverty, career uncertainty, family troubles and periods of hopelessness we kept spinning the wheel, hoping it would get better.

And when I turned my LIFE cards over at the end I discovered I'd done great things. I'd found a new energy source, written the great American novel, created a new teaching method, had a huge success with a toy invention, been given a humanitarian award, started a health food chain, won a Pulitzer prize, invented a new ice cream flavour, won a lifetime achievement award and, best of all, I'd become the president. And I know it's just a game, but I felt some little flutterings of pride.

I like to think that I can learn something from this - maybe about the value of perseverance, the power of a little faith, or how to accept that the game of life is just going to go the way it's going to go.

Or maybe I just learnt that recent graduates shouldn't play the game. We clearly read too much into it.