my mom recently asked me, nonchalantly, “do you think i should have seen a psychiatrist sometime?” of course she should have. so should i. i think, perhaps, a good 99.9% of us should. because we’re not as friggin put together as we all think we are. so i asked her, “well, if you think they do any good, why didn’t you let me keep seeing one after my childhood trauma?” to which her response was, “well, she was weird; all new-agey and crap. i didn’t like her.” as if that was the only psychiatrist that was available to us at the time, so she had no other choice. but i digress…

counseling doesn’t have to come from some shrink in a chair with a diploma over her head and the ny times crossword on her lap behind the notepad. counseling literally means “guidance: something that provides direction or advice as to a decision or course of action.” and that is never something you can get too much of. everyone could use a little input. some constructive criticisms (which aren’t necessarily all bad!). otherwise, you know what you get? an over-inflated (read: hollow) idea of who you are and why you think you’re perfect.

as for the knees… i’ve never necessarily been rough on mine, but i gotta say, they’re still going… and one day they’ll be gone. and then i’ll wish i had taken the stairs more often. so; be kind to your knees, yes. but take the stairs. that is all.

if you’re on twitter and you have a blog, chances are you’ve heard of #blogchat. someone put a bug in my ear about it awhile back, and i’ve followed it for several weeks. the problem was, as i followed along, i realized that the majority of the people involved each sunday night were generally two kinds of people; bloggers that blogged for money, or bloggers that blogged for some work-related reason. i saw very few instances of people that blogged just for the fun of it like i do, so i wasn’t really relating to the conversation very well. and since it wasn’t applying to me, i respectfully butted out, and just watched and tried to learn something.

then this week, the topic was supposed to be something i could relate to; whether or not you blog anonymously and why. i thought, hey! i have a reason to join the conversation finally (yay!) and so i did. i added a thought or two. i think, in total, 5 tweets. but the conversation was going off course, there was this whole side conversation about which phones/service people use (frankly, i think because the #blogchat founder, mack collier, admittedly wasn’t really paying attention) and so it got boring quickly, so i left early. next morning, i noticed two things: 1) i suddenly had 20 new followers and 2) mack had given links to not only the transcript of the #blogchat, but also to the list of participants.

i did what i always do when i get new followers, i went to check them out, see where they’re from, what they talk about. and i noticed a disturbing trend; 19 of the 20 of them all had the exact same most recent people they were all following. and all of them also had incredibly stupid-high follower/following counts. additionally, all of their most recent tweets were eerily similar; stuff like “how to increase your number of followers in 2 hours” or “get your blog’s seo noticed” etc. etc. so i did what i always do when i find that i’m being followed by shallow-one-hit-wonder look-how-many-people-follow-me types, i reported them for spam. not just because they followed me, but because they clearly went and followed all 200 and some people that participated in #blogchat. in other words, whether they had participated or not, they just harvested the list for followers. which i find to be a rude practice. and i said so:

okay #blogchat people, i really don’t appreciate the influx of spammy followers the morning after i participate in #blogchat. rude.

now, realize of course, that i only got 140 characters in which to voice my complaint, yes? but it wasn’t just a few minutes when mack decided to respond: “@TWBiotch Why are you spamming the #blogchat hashtag with your complaints? Why not spam the people you think are spamming you?” giving him the benefit of the doubt, i replied, “@MackCollier i’m not spamming the #blogchat hashtag & resent the implication; but i can’t help but notice all the ppl i just reported were all following the same participants of blogchat from last night. mine was a warning/complaint. calm down.” which, i thought, was a pretty good explanation. he disagreed. he said, “So you reported the people you didn’t like, then decided to spam the people that have no idea what you are talking about. Congrats” now, that last little dig, the “Congrats” pissed me off. i could hear the patronizing tone of voice behind it. hell, i use it all the time. still, i tried (really, i did!) to take the high road. i said, “i was simply pointing it out, because obviously what WAS a good blogging tool has become a spam farm. lighten the %*$! up.” but not mack. maybe the air is too thin up on the high road? i dunno. but he decided to get another dig in on me, “Well it’s still a good tool for most of us. Maybe your usage of the tool attracted the wrong people.” oh, so it’s just me? and what about the other hundreds of people that also suddenly got a bunch of $hit followers? i asked, “if it did, then maybe the other 100 or so of the other users they spammed are also the “wrong” type. what’s your problem w/me?” i again attempted to explain my position, “i just dumped 18 followers that all added me beg. @ 9 pm 7/5. i appreciate real fans, not follow-me/i’ll-follow-you spammers. i thought the whole point of blogchat was to be a community of bloggers, not just increase our follower counts.”

somehow, somewhere, no matter how i tried to explain my position, he just kept missing the point and assuming i was complaining about #blogchat. he stayed on the defense, “You have 100 followers now, how big was this ‘influx’ & how are those followers hurting you?” and in response to my explanation of the type of followers i appreciate, “Ok there’s an easy way to handle that, just don’t follow them back. Sorry but that’s life on Twitter, #blogchat has zip to do w it, Try participating in other Twitter chats & see what happens. I honestly think your avatar/name likely attracts them somewhat.” again, blaming me, blaming my name/avatar. again, ignoring my clearly stated point that it wasn’t *just* me, it was hundreds of people that this happened to. he went on (and finally stated what his problem was), “By participating in twitter chats, you pick up followers. No *my* problem is you saying the #blogchat community is ‘rude’” – which, you can see, clearly shows that he wasn’t really listening to me this whole time, was he? so i replied, “but blogchat was clearly where they came from all at once like that. i get 1 or 2 spammers a day, not 20 & it was more than me, again, i was attempting to point out a problem, not create 1, as you seem to think i have. didn’t realize u could own a hashtag.” i said, “i think your whole problem is that i actually complained about it & they didn’t; maybe they don’t care who follows them. i do. i’ve followed along on blogchat for weeks, but only actually jumped in 3-4 times for the 1st time last night. then, tada, spam.” and he replied, “So again, don’t follow them back. Problem solved!” (still missing my point) so i answered, “obviously i’m not; but i’m not going to encourage their behavior by letting them follow me, either & neither should others. AGAIN, it wasn’t just me they did it to, so it’s clear what they’re doing. tell you what, you tweet ur way, i’ll do it mine.” and to his saying i was calling the “community ‘rude’ i said, “i said the ppl that spammed the followers of #blogchat were rude! sorry it wasn’t PERFECTLY clear in just 140 characters. damn!” but he wouldn’t give up. he’s a bulldog, that mack. he said, “I think you are creating a lot of unnecessary work for yourself. If you dont follow back in a day or 2, they will unfollow YOU. And it would suck to report someone as a spammer if they weren’t, right?” which, i’ll be frank, i read as a double entendre – one, that i was wrong in saying i was spammed and two, that he could just as easily report me for it. and i said as much, “your veiled implication that i’m a spammer is unwarranted. if i wanted to spam blogchat, i’d be hashtagging it all the time & it’s not unecessary work if i actually give a rat’s ass who follows me. if u don’t, good for u. ur life is easier then, hmm?”

after which, finally, i thought he was going to relent. he said, “Nevermind, you’re right, you do it your way, I’ll do it mine.” and i said, “thank you, that was my plan. glad i now have your permission (not that i needed it).” which, apparently, still ruffled his feathers. he said, “Dear God honey please stop being a drama queen. Seriously.” which, actually, ruffled mine. not just  anyone can call me honey. i said, where, exactly, was i being a drama queen? and don’t call me honey, we’re not that close.” he finally (thankfully) stopped talking. to me. he was still talking out the side of his mouth to others, apparently. others that, like him, just weren’t getting it: @chrisyates11 said, “We love everyone i think!? RT @MackCollier: @TWBiotch *my* problem is you saying the #blogchat community is ‘rude’” – see, selective listening. they went on,“We just tripled your followers list u should b thrilled RT @TWBiotch #blogchat don’t appreciate spammy followers after #blogchat. rude. @ArtseyC @MackCollier not sure why she was complaining about followers she only had 103 I think #blogchat helped her so she should luv us!” chris is not sure what i’m complaining about, because they don’t care about who follows them, and they’re not in on this whole conversation, either. then @sue_anne had to jump in, “@chrisyates11 @MackCollier I’ve noticed that people with a small number of followers get antsy when people they don’t know follow them.” oh, for the love of all that’s holy, people, i wasn’t antsy. i was raising a red flag! i was serving up a warning! still, mack encouraged them, “@chrisyates11 Yeah if anyone thinks we are rude, not sure what they are looking at ;) #blogchat” and “@sue_anne @chrisyates11 But why get upset over ’spammers’ following you to get a follow back? Just ignore em and they unfollow in few days” still not conceding to my point in the least. and, finally, @amycanada just had to put in her two-cents worth, “@chrisyates11 @MackCollier She skeered of us. Fear = anger sometimes. Once she (if she) gets to know us she’ll LUV us.” which makes me just stop, blink a few times and say, what the %#*& are you talking about? still, i tried to set her (and her hillbilly language) straight, i said, “@ArtseyC i’m not scared of $hit; i wasn’t mad @ #blogchat, i was mad @ spammers, i don’t need a high follower # to feel superior.” it was an exercise in futility. she just replied this morning, “@TWBiotch Well, then, darlin’ call out those who spammed you, not hundreds of people who have nothing to do with you or your spam. #blogchat” clearly also not paying attention. *sigh*

*facepalm* i guess, just for $hits and grins, since they apparently all think i’m the spammer now anyway, i could just start hashtagging all my tweets with #blogchat for all eternity. but, no. too low a road. in fact, i’ve got it all out of my system now.

*we now return you to your irregularly unscheduled blog posts, already in session.*

and then there’s checking my email. because god knows, every day brings the chance that there will be an email from mom. so that’s pretty scary.

but other things, scary things… stuff i’ve told myself i should do, because it’s what makes life interesting. recently, i was offered the opportunity to go skydiving. at first, i said i’d do it. then, as the day drew closer, i started to chicken out. finally, the night before, i was losing sleep. fortunately (i guess) the day was postponed due to weather. i was glad. but sad, too. because part of me really wants to do it. the other part? scared outta my mind. i’m hoping the former wins, next time the opportunity arises.

there’s a shop in market street called lululemon athletica, and on tuesdays they offer yoga. used to be pilates. i’ve never done both. i’d like to do either. i have the time. i can easily fit it in my schedule. but do i? no. i wimp out, every tuesday, without fail. i’ve managed to put it off, in one form or another, for nearly thirty weeks now. craziness!

so i think this one, really, i need to take to heart. i need to rethink my self-stated bravery and actually do something. everyday. that scares me. really.

and you should too. i promise, it’ll make your life more interesting. no one ever gets to the end and says, “well, i’m glad i never did one thing that would constitute calling myself brave. that’s a relief.”

sing.

…as for that one, that’s easy. in the car, in the shower, at my desk, watching tv, drying my hair, folding the laundry… everywhere except where mom wants me to – which is on a stage on karaoke night somewhere with her. singing i’ve got covered.

i know, i know… as my mom said in an email to me this morning (in reply to my email, the first one i’d sent her in a week) “yeah, it’s been since like christmas since i’ve heard from you. yeah, yeah. hardy-har. you know, i’m not on a schedule here. it’s my blog, and i’ll blog if i want to.

well, that’s not entirely accurate. i want to blog way more often than i do. so i guess it’s more accurate to say, it’s my blog and i’ll procrastinate on blogging while i take care of things that pay the bills if i want to… but i digress.

second today in my series of advice that i’ve given, taken and ignored…

i think of the above stanza of the song pretty often. in relation to myself, i think, ‘ehm, no.’ i mean, when i look back on pictures of me 20 years ago, the first thing i think is ‘daaaayuuummm… no wonder i was a virgin all through school. can we say unibrow?’ no, but seriously, the one part of this i do try to take for myself is the last statement, about being fat. i know i’m not. not really. sure, i could stand to lose a few, most of us could. but as i just mentioned to the bf the other day, hey – i’m still in single digit sizes. which, honestly? i wasn’t always in. so i gotta find that precious balance between not being so hard on myself, and not convincing myself that just because i’m not fat doesn’t mean i couldn’t end up fat. and it’s not necessarily that being fat scares me… it’s the health risks that go along with it. what it means to your heart, your joints, your respritory system, your back, your colon and, some would say most of all, your mind – your self worth, your self value. you don’t have to be stuck up. you don’t have to be a diva. but you do have to love yourself. because you can’t love someone else until you do.

and as for the rest of this part of the song? i think of it every time i see girls that are currently in those random, awkward stages we have all gone through and survived. the girls that sit quietly in the corner of the library, reading books about third-world countries and wondering what they could be doing about it. the girls that at the tender ages of 13, 14, 16… think that they have to paint themselves another face, because the one they have is so inherently flawed. that’s your mind’s eye, sweetie. not the rest of the world’s.

but please, don’t misunderstand. there’s a huge chasm of a gap between teaching girls self-worth and empowerment and puffing them up with endless praise and princess tiaras. one will teach them they can do anything, and don’t need anyone’s approval. the other will teach them they can do nothing without it getting someone’s approval.

and seeing as how this is quite possibly the most fabulous collection of unsolicited advice ever assembled and subsequently put to music, i thought i’d start here, and work my way through it. so to start things off, here is all of the advice in it’s entirety, and i’ll begin breaking it down in my next post:

Wear sunscreen.  If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.  The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience.  I will dispense this advice now.

 Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth — oh, never mind — you will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until they have faded.  But trust me in twenty years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked.  You are not as fat as you imagine.  Don’t worry about the future, or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum.  The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindsides you at 4:00 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.

 Do one thing every day that scares you – sing.  Don’t be reckless with other peoples’ hearts and don’t put up with people that are reckless with yours.  Floss.  Don’t waste your time on jealousy.  Sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind, the race is long.  But in the end – it’s only with yourself.  Remember compliments you receive, forget the insults.  If you succeed in doing this, tell me how. 

 Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements.  Stretch.  Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives.  Some of the most interesting 40 year-olds still don’t.  Get plenty of counseling.  Be kind to your knees – you’ll miss them when they’re gone. 

 Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t.  Maybe you’ll have children, maybe you won’t.  Maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky chicken on your 75^th wedding anniversary.  Whatever you do don’t congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either, your choices are half chance.  So are everybody else’s.  Enjoy your body.  Use it every way you can.  Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it, it’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.  Dance.  Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.  Read the directions – even if you don’t follow them.  Do not read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly.

 Get to know your parents, you never know when they’ll be gone for good.  Be nice to your siblings, they’re your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.  Understand that friends come and go, but to a precious few you should hold on.  Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, ‘cause the older you get, the more you need the people you knew when you were young.

 Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard.  Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.  Travel.  Accept certain inalienable truths; prices will rise, politicians will philander, you too will get old.  And when you do you’ll fantasize that when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble, and children respected their elders.  Respect your elders.  Don’t expect anyone else to support you.  Maybe you have a trust fund, maybe you’ll have a wealthy spouse, but you never know when either one might run out. 

 Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time you’re 40 it will look 85.  Be careful who’s advise you buy, but be patient with those who supply it.  Advise is a form of nostalgia – dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.   But trust me on the sunscreen. 

i’ll tell you this much – i haven’t “tanned” since i was sixteen, and considering how dark-like-a-native i know i can get, i’m pretty freakin’ lily white. but i’m also skin-cancer-free, and hardly frecked, and definitely not leathery. so there’s that. ;o) more to come…

oh yeah…

cause i skipped kindergarten.

anyway….

another thought i had was a song, actually. you know – “everybody’s free (to wear sunscreen)”. the ultimate graduation song. well, of course it’s not really age-appropriate for kindergarteners. better for college. high school, anyway. point is, the song was in my head, which gave me an idea for a series of blog posts. which i was going to start on, till i went to start writing a post a few hours ago only to discover that i couldn’t access my blog, because it was apparently down, so while waiting for hostgator to fix the mysterious problem, i got distracted and checked my email, which included a cute little forward from a friend of mine, which was about what happens when you ask 26 first graders to come up with their own endings to well-known proverbs… which of course isn’t kindergartners, but i’ve already changed the subject here, haven’t you been following along? *sheesh* so all that said… i’ll start on my series sometime this weekend, and in the meantime, enjoy some random thoughts plucked from the minds of first graders, because seriously, they cracked me up!

1. Don’t change horses…     until they stop running.
2. Strike while the…     bug is close.
3. It’s always darkest before…     Daylight Saving Time.
4. Never underestimate the power…     of termites.
5. You can lead a horse to water but…     How?
6. Don’t bite the hand that…     looks dirty.
7. No news is…     impossible
8. A miss is as good as a…     Mr.
9. You can’t teach an old dog new…     Math
10. If you lie down with dogs, you’ll…     stink in the morning.
11. Love all, trust…     Me.
12. The pen is mightier than…     the pigs.
13. An idle mind is…     the best way to relax.
14. Where there’s smoke there’s…     pollution.
15. Happy the bride who…     gets all the presents.
16. A penny saved is…     not much.
17. Two’s company, three’s…     the Musketeers.
18. Don’t put off till tomorrow what…     you put on to go to bed.
19. Laugh and the whole world laughs with you, cry and…     You have to blow your nose.
20. There are none so blind as…     Stevie Wonder.
21. Children should be seen and not…     spanked or grounded.
22. If at first you don’t succeed…     get new batteries.
23. You get out of something only what you…     See in the picture on the box
24. When the blind lead the blind…      get out of the way.
25. A bird in the hand is…     going to poop on you.
26. Better late than…     pregnant

didja hear? the red-headed neighbors are having a garbage community yard sale. they think it’s going to be sooo great, they’re doing it for two days in a row.

now, if the woodlands can manage to condense 90,000 + people’s yard sale desires into a twice-a-year, four hour event, what makes shenandoah think they really have enough crap to go for two days solid, spread over the park and surrounding areas? really?

yeah… no. cause in “old times” i stayed in touch with my friends by calling them. and they called me. and sometimes we called each other several times a day. at a minimum several times a month. and when we grew up and grew apart, far-flung across the country, we could have practically become stockholders in hallmark — if only hallmark was publicly traded and not privately held. we mailed each other cards for birthdays and christmas, easter, st. patrick’s day, valentines day, halloween, thanksgiving, good days, bad days, idle tuesdays…

and now in the age of mobile phones that don’t charge long distance, and email and e-cards eliminating the need to pay postage, you’d think we could stay in contact even easier, right? but apparently i’m missing something here. apparently despite all of these innovations, we still just can’t keep up with each other without using facebook. well, i beg to differ. and i’m not alone.

according to marshall kirkpatrick at readwriteweb, a number of high-profile web industry leaders have quit facebook this week, a turn of events that’s sure to heat up conversation about the social network’s perceived transgressions. and what are these transgressions? constant, unapologetic invasion, and disregard, of privacy. facebook founder mark zuckerberg told a live audience on january 8 that the world has changed, that it’s become more public and less private, and that the controversial new default and permanent settings reflect how the site would work if he were to create it today. facebook’s ceo has a documented history of unethical behavior. from the very beginning of facebook’s existence, there are questions about zuckerberg’s ethics. according to businessinsider.com, he used facebook user data to guess email passwords and read personal email in order to discredit his rivals. these allegations, albeit unproven and somewhat dated, nonetheless raise troubling questions about the ethics of the ceo of the world’s largest social network. they’re particularly compelling given that facebook chose to fork over $65M to settle a related lawsuit alleging that zuckerberg had actually stolen the idea for facebook.

and how complicated are the privacy policies of facebook? well, considering that the collective privacy policies of facebook are more verbose than the united states constitution, i’d say, pretty damn complicated. especially when you consider how disparagingly their privacy policies have eroded over time.

sadly, despite all of this evidence, everyone i know that uses facebook still seems to think that they can be careful enough to not let anything bad happen to them if they keep on using it. and, while it’s true that some people i know truly are smart enough to stay ahead of the game, so many others are not. just as farhad manjoo has talked about at slate.com, it’s undeniable, every previous imbroglio has ended the same way: they all shrug their shoulders, consider the problem fixed, and go back to goofing off on facebook.

so in case you need just a few more reasons to quit facebook, here is what i believe is the best collection of top 10 reasons to quit (click any reason to see the full explanation):

and if you do finally decide that perhaps leaving facebook is the right choice, there is at least one strong alternative coming to light that may help you with your withdrawals. it’s called diaspora* (yes, with the asterisk) which is marketing itself as the “anti-facebook”

as for me, i intend to leave things as they are. stick with my status quo. there’s no reason why anyone can’t have a private life – even when it’s online. and a public life – out there in the real world. and as for keeping in touch with my friends and family? well, i think i need to send out a few emails in the morning. it’s been a couple of days. ;o)

now, now… not as in, “you’re momma’s so fat, when she sits around the house, she sits around the house” but as in, “wow, why do you think that people will like you more if you continue to lie to them and deceive them?”

anywho, needless to say that i follow fellow woodlandites, seeing as how i’m, you know, a woodlandite. but here lately there have been a couple of wannabe woodlandites that have completely gotten under my skin. at first it was this guy: @thewoodlandstex because i did a little digging and i’m about 99% certain that he’s actually from kingwood. cause at first i checked his site out (which i hesitate to link to, but then again, i couldn’t care less if he knows i don’t like him or his site) and i thought he probably wasn’t really from here, seeing as how so much of his information is outdated and just plain wrong. but then when i check out the forum on his website, and didn’t recognise street names that people were referring to, so i started mapping them, i discovered they were out in bfe – er – kingwood. and what really chaps me (call me anal retentive) is that he actually has the balls to call his site the “official” site. and then i caught him tweeting crap on the wrong days. i called him on that one. first he tries to tell me it’s cause i can’t read. then he tried to pass it off as “oh, i set that up to tweet automatically, but i put in pm instead of am.”

dude, whatever. you can tweet from anywhere at any time. you f*&ked up. just admit it.

and now there’s @thewoodlandsnet which is supposed to be (i guess) the twitter account for the site that supposed to be the woodlands resident’s site. which you would *think* would mean that it’d be run by people that are from here. not only from here, but maybe even part of management. or government. or whatever the hell we call the people in charge now. but they have this incredibly annoying habit of tweeting in like, i dunno, projectile-vomit bursts, all at once, all on sunday nights, all the time. what is up with that?? and because they only tweet every now and again, instead of daily or routinely even, they have a tendency to get very irrelevant. but last night, they took the cake. because last night, they tweeted about an event that happened… wait for it… seven weeks ago. like it was a big deal!! i mean seriously!! who gives a rat’s ass that the crawfish festival back in march was a “huge success” now??? and then there was something about summer camps for kids. now, i don’t have kids, so i don’t care, necessarily. but it did seem kind of odd that the article would be about just the ymca camps. when the woodlands is putting on like two dozen camps itself. you know. that might matter.

am i the only one that reads the seasonal action guides? well, no, i guess not. looks like they got it right over at WoodlandsEvents. is it any wonder why they’ve been my favourite woodlands website for ages now? seeing as how they actually get all the information. get it right. and get it timely enough to be, you know, useful? maybe that’s because it’s actually run by people that live here. and work here. and play here. and are from here. just sayin’.

okie dokie then. rant over.

i like to use the smaller carts whenever possible. they’re more maneuverable. i go to the store with a pretty good idea with how much i’m going to buy, and more often than not, it’s a perfect fit. this was no exception. all the stuff fit right in the cart. till i checked out. this woman that could easily pass as my mother was the sacker. at first that made me feel bad. my mom’s sixty-one after all. but then i discovered she’s not just a sacker. she’s a slacker. packed all my groceries totally haphazardly so that they wouldn’t fit back in the cart, then didn’t get me a larger cart from just outside the door, then wouldn’t offer to help me out to my car. she did, however, help me to load three bags onto my arm.  so while i was on my way across the parking lot, i managed to drop my produce all over the parking lot. fabulous.

but it’s worse than that. (worse? you ask… oh, yes… much) apparently, this not-quite-all-in-ness has infected the entirety of the woodlands rotary, and by proxy, the woodlands township. how? you ask. well, simple really. i mean, is it just me, or do most people plan to celebrate oktoberfest in, you know, october?

no, no, not the rotary. and not the township. no, for them, oktoberfest comes just a little earlier this year. as in, in september. way to go.

i’m just sayin’.