Consistency is a BITCH!

After the Diet Coke blog, as I often do, I examined why I even thought so hard about it...


I have a heightened sense of alertness and perception at all times. It's a burden as much as a strength. My brain feels responsible for tracking and keeping up with everything, and organizing that information constantly with a sub-disease of trying hard not to be wasteful. It drives my sister nuts - she has the opposite ability to just fucking buy more paperclips when you can't remember where you put the last box a thousand years ago. Me? I misplace the paperclips but if I concentrate and picture it in my brain, I can conjure up the memory of where it is. This is not instinct or organization, it is literally recalling a picture in my mind's eye, even if I haven't physically seen the item in years.

My husband has learned to use my filing system for his own benefit, but I pity him at times too because it demands consistency and he has absolutely none. Oddly, his random mind is a huge part of why we're good for eachother but if it weren't for his pure heart, genuine personality, and total honesty he'd never be able to stand me.


School was always a breeze and it's a great quality for work because I never have to ask the same question twice.


I have to physically force myself to LET GO at times. I should have LET GO of that wasted can of Diet Coke. I didn't.

My brain is always counting things and I don't even realize it until something goes missing. My husband can ask me where one of his hundred blue Bic pens is and I know exactly which one he means and exactly where he left it 3 months ago. I am like a Navigation system, I am utterly unable to get lost, even when I want to.

It is consuming brain activity, but most days, I am unable to stop it. This happens with or without my cooperation. I am able to reign it in and/or let it out at times where it can be helpful or appropriate, but I cannot stop it. So, I make every effort to use it for good instead of evil.

Most regretably, I cannot guarantee that this character flaw of mine won't get you in trouble with me someday. Although I make a point of keeping the results of identified inconsistencies to myself unless they are earth-shattering in nature, it does happen.


Case in point: You should not vehemently agree with me that racism is an abhorrent, uneducated, and disgusting point of view and then 12 years later, look over your shoulders and the proceed to use the N word in my presence. It will cause me to evaluate the truthfulness of everything else you've ever said to me. Sorry. I didn't mean to remember that conversation from 12 years ago when you gushed "tolerance if not acceptance" and shit like that.


I'm pretty sure your apetite for or comfort level with the N word is not something that increases with age and wisdom, which means you've always felt that way, but you faked it for my sake at one point in time.



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Virtual Childhood

It's such a huge loss that kids only know how to interact with eachother from behind the safety of their pc and would have no idea how to actually play spin the bottle in person. They are missing out on so much! Life skills you learn as a teen from interacting, facing rejection, dealing with real emotions - are all performed in a virtual world. I wonder if teens even pass notes in school anymore what with the advent of texting.

As a teen, I did whatever I could to see my friends including walk 4 miles in a blizzard on a snow day to meet at a greasy breakfast joint - or - hiking my skinny ass all the way up Pinnacle Mountain in the dark and freezing cold just to drink shitty keg beer! It was good, (un)clean fun! Now, a snowday means who can I IM today? It's all so virtual, there is barely anything real left! I'd hate to be a teenager nowadays!




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Six Degrees of Separation? Try 2!

6 Degrees of Seperation? More like 2!!

I realized while drafting an email the other day, how MySpace and Facebook have entirely reduced the 6 Degrees of Seperation to about 2 degrees.

It's creepy - I've lived all over the US and I have a handful of close friends who I've stayed in touch with through every move. I used to pride myself on being the kind of friend who stays in touch. MySpace and Facebook make the world seem so small (and cheap!).

I'm not one to really search through profiles of friends and their friends because it is simply OVERWHELMING! It spins out of control when you think about it, but I have done it - you know who you are! I guess it depends on my mood or if I'm bored at work...

Making a list of people I know who DO NOT have a MySpace and /or Facebook would be much less work than making a list of those who do. What is that? And to browse them all, you see just such a different side of the people you think you know. And of course, you do the whole "Would I even be friends with you if I just saw your profile? thing" and even if you find them, you don't always want them to find you, who knows why. I'm telling you - it's fucking creepy!

I do my best NOT to get addicted, but sadly - I think it surpasses e-mail and the address book I've painstakingly kept up with forever for keeping in touch with people anymore. With MySpace and Facebook, you don't need to remember any email addresses other than your own.
What would we do if MySpace / Facebook was shut down or went out of service all the sudden one day? The only thing I can imagine that would annoy me more is losing my cell phone (only because it has irreplaceable phone numbers in the phone book).

I've had a MySpace for about 14 months now and as much as I resist, I rely on it! Ugg! I mean I am a staunch believer in my old fashioned Franklin Planner - I cannot adopt the technology of a Palm Pilot - I mean what if the battery up and died on me? I cannot give up my check register - even though my husband INSISTS that I am stubborn like a mule and QuickBooks would work financial miracles for us. We use it for his business, I am GOOD at QuickBooks and I still refuse to use it for personal use. I don't think you should find out the sex of your baby until it is born! I am a technology whiz in most areas, but there are some things I think are sacred and need to stay HUMAN!

Thoughts?