Category Archives: rants

Let’s… shop? How about we not?

I’ll be honest, Thanksgivings growing up kind of blurs together in my memory with Christmas. I remember going to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. And I remember watching the Texas A&M vs Texas game each year. And probably the Cowboy’s game. But, again, it all kind of blurs together, detail-wise.

But here is what doesn’t blur over time: That feeling of family. That feeling of love. That warm feeling in my heart that both bring. I remember turkey, dressing, green bean casserole, and lots of kolaches. I remember not having school and my parents not going to work that day. I remember construction paper turkeys, and I remember dressing up as a pilgrim a time or two.

As years passed, I remember ATTENDING the Texas A&M vs Texas game on Thanksgiving. And years later I remember making my own turkey and dressing so my husband could head out on the road with an early evening bus call. I’ve spent Thanksgiving surrounded by friends who are like family when we couldn’t make the trip to Texas or Oregon to be with family.

Thanksgiving has morphed as I’ve gotten older, but one thing that has not changed: it’s about love, thanks, and taking stock of my many, many blessings.

The one thing I refuse… I REFUSE… to let into Thanksgiving: shopping.

I can’t do it. I just can’t. Sometimes you need a few groceries… okay, I can go with that. And maybe you need to eat out instead of cooking at home. Or you need gas. But Christmas shopping… I just can’t do it. I didn’t like when “Black Friday” started at midnight, but now it starts as early as 5 pm Thanksgiving day. This just feels wrong to me.

I know many people who participate in Black Friday shopping. And that’s fine. That’s their thing. It doesn’t mean its mine. I’d rather stay home eating good food, enjoying the people I am with, watching some football and/or a movie… perhaps I’ll even decorate for Christmas. Hot coffee, the fire place, my cats and some baked goods. That just sounds AMAZING to me.

Some people get pleasure from it and get this adrenaline high of making the sales and being in the rush. Shopping to them sounds amazing. But, from my point of view, I don’t want to push and shove and leave hating humanity and feeling guilty for abusing my bank account. That doesn’t make me feel thankful. It makes me feel nothing but negative. Forgive me if I pass, and if I wrinkle my nose at you if you decide to go shop. It’s just not my thing.

  someecards.com - BLACK FRIDAY Because only in America do we wait in line and trample others for sale items one day after giving thanks for what we already have.

Five on Friday: Social Media Pet Peeves

When you are on social media as much as I am, you quickly start finding things that just get on your last nerve. Here are my top five pet peeves. Warning… this post is heavily filled with sarcasm and snark. Have a nice weekend! :)

1. I read posts that use what I call “internet shorthand” like I’m reading a Wheel of Fortune puzzle. “If u want 2 c me 2day, come 2 the bar n by me a drink.” Uhm. Why? I know Twitter only allows 140 characters so you have to get creative sometimes. But other times you’re just being an annoying little twit(terer) that is not worth my time. For what its worth, this applies to text messages as well. I’ve been known to flat out ignore texts written like this and not respond at all. If I am going to type out full words (I mean, “to” is just a pain to type out) then I feel you can do the same with me. Leave the shorthand for the tweens.  As a bonus to this annoyance, I now totally relate to my editing professor from college these days. Dr. Starr? I get it now.

someecards.com - Your incessant use of internet shorthand and text message acronyms concerns me.

2. Pay attention to location. I hate, hate, hate getting flooded with event invitation to things out of the state. I have a lot of friends who have either moved to out of state or they simply travel a lot. I get at least once a week an invite to an event in a state I’ve never even visited… and I am not going to go now, much less to attend your grandma’s 80th birthday at the Shady Tree Retirement Center and Spa. Never mind I don’t know your grandma on top of that. Please, please, please do not send out invites to your entire friends list with complete abandon. Have the courtesy to think about who you are inviting. You might be thinking, “Oh its one event invitation, they won’t mind.” Yeah, but 10 other people had that same thought and now I sit here long ago ceasing to be amused and I’ve landed smack dab in Annoyedville. (*Note that the ONLY exception to this rule is my friends and family in Texas. I am down there enough that its worth throwing me invites, because I just might be there to be able to go.)

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3. Don’t send me a friend invitation if you can’t have the courtesy of having your real name on your profile page. If there is one thing I lament Facebook changing, its their old strict real-name-only policy. I get friend invitations from people using blatantly fake names, without a photo, and without ANYTHING publicly visible in their About me page. I end up in an internal debate of wanting to just click ignore, but instead occasionally I end up accepting the friend request just so MAYBE I can access more information as to who the person is… only to (most of the time) end up deleting them because I have no clue who they are. (*An exception: I have plenty of people friended that I don’t actually know in person, but we have so many people in common we are bound to cross paths eventually. I might as well go ahead and figure out who they are before then.)   An extension of this, I will never understand why some people can’t have at least ONE photo of themselves on their profile pages.  Just one! I don’t care if you think you look like the love child of Quasimodo and the Wicked Witch of the West (which… you totally don’t look like that) I want to see YOU!

catmando

4. Like or share. Favorite or retweet. Oh stop it. I really don’t want to play these games. I expect it from teens and tweens and am totally okay with it there. But you’re 35 freakin’ years old. Stop needing that kind of validation and child’s play. Okay? Just. Stop. That includes you SportsCenter. “Like if team A will win, retweet if team B will win.” Just stop it. It’s right up there with the kid having a meltdown in the cereal aisle because Mom bought Shredded Wheat instead of Coco Puffs.  No one REALLY cares.

likeorshare

5. I am a Christian, and I love God.  I believe everyone with any sort of illness or disease or whatever should be respected and loved and prayed for. I think our military rocks, and I am thankful for them. I have an amazing Mom, Dad, brother, in-laws, niece, nephew, aunts, uncles, etc. I do not need to post this picture in my profile for one hour to make those facts true. Please stop trying to guilt me into it because, “I know who will do it and who won’t and if you don’t you’re a jerk face meanie.”

someecards.com - We're supposed to show we love God through our everyday actions. But, I'm pretty sure that means doing more than clicking

 

 

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