Happy Little Trees

It would probably be good to buy Starbucks stock the week before the early time change day, because I know for certain, sales would be up the week after.

I don't like waking up in the dark. I'm not living in Alaska. --And that's why I fell back to sleep after turning off the alarm. I had a good excuse!

I can't believe I had the willpower to do it, but I did it. I deactivated my Facebook account.

With a deactivation, to restart the account, I just login. I can still receive invites and fun stuff, so it's still up to my willpower to ignore it, but it already feels very freeing. I read Amanda's post and felt that confirmed that I needed to opt out of it for awhile. I have a specific account for Young Life that I have access to, so I will still get to post pics from Young Life, and that's really all I need Facebook for anyway.

I have plenty of cyber-ties: e-mail, texting, twittering, and a blog. It's nice to have one less--especially being someone with little self-control and an always connected iPhone.

So, Happy Little Trees, it's more attention to you, again!

Dear iPhone Stealer,

I am assuming that I left my car unlocked unless you used a cool gadget where you were able to duplicate my car's code...or maybe I just forgot to press the lock button before I went into Buffalo Grille. Whatever the case, you got into my car.

I first noticed you had been in my car when I noticed my car charger and three foot USB cord were missing, along with the phone out of my bag.

I don't know why you took my iPhone. As far as iPhone's go, mine was a bit ghetto. I had a really ugly pink case on it that had what I assume to be my dead skin trapped in between the case and the phone. I also had dropped it a few times. Are you going to use those skin cells to clone me?

Also, please just delete my personal info and use it for your own private use. And if you think my calendar of baby showers and weddings looks fun, if you come to the events, please bring a gift and feel free to attend in my place, but be nice.

iPhone stealer, I feel a bit violated. I had lots of pictures on my phone of my dog, my Young Life kids, and things I liked. You took that. You took my Scramble 2 level. You took my Pandora account. You took my Beth Moore reading of Get Out of the Pit--which you should listen to, because if you are stealing iPhones, you've got to be in some kind of pit.

You took my first text messages from my new boyfriend that I read over and over. And my text messages with Leslee which make me laugh--you're not going to get our inside jokes!

I am praying for you, iPhone stealer. I pray that you get what you need with a stolen iPhone, but most importantly, I pray God gets ahold of you--not to spank you silly, but to shake a bit of reality into your life so you can wake-up and know that life is so much more than iPhone stealing. God has a plan for you beyond a plan with unlimited text messaging and internet browsing.

Also, I have a new iPhone. It can make videos, and it's white. And this time, I won't leave it in my car, so tough turkey!

Sincerely,
Beth

I became a Facebook user a few years ago after visiting some old friends from Camp Hollymont. We had a big camp reunion and most of the girls who had been my pre-teen campers were college and graduate school graduates that were big supporters of staying connected via Facebook. My personal rule was going to be not to have any local Houston friends, because why would I need to connect with them online since distance wasn't an issue?

But I caved. Severely.

I am not very selective with my acceptance of Facebook friends. I have Facebook friend guilt in the worst way. I figure if somebody wanted to be my friend, I shouldn't deny them--despite the fact that I might not even remember how we were connected and if they were standing in front of my face I would have to say, "Now who are you?"

Since joining, I have collected quite a large number of "friends." In real life, I do have a quite a large amount of friends. I have been blessed. And I've lived in four corners of the US and in the middle, and I've worked with large numbers of children that are now adults. I also come from a large extended family. My grandmother had 15 brothers and sisters. One of her brothers had 11 children. And they all multiplied, hence, I have a non-manageable amount of Facebook friends.

It can seem like a parttime job at times. And sometimes it can be the place where I go to escape and view someone else's world for awhile. I can find pictures of friend's spouses and children and current friends. It's like going to my 20th reunion without having to worry about weightgain or wrinkles. It's all just out there in cyber reunion world.

Sometimes I think I'm done with it. I get tired of having another e-mail account to check. Or reading inappropriate things that are posted by teenagers I know that forget the WORLD has access to their writings. And I really hate the games alerts and quiz alerts. Those drive me crazy.

I noticed that in real life, there are some friends I don't call anymore. Because I can follow them on Facebook. But I miss our conversations, and realized that the life I'm following is just cyber life, and it leaves me feeling more disconnected than connected.

I'm debating closing my account. I think it would give me more time to have real connections again. And take away the Facebook tick I've developed from constantly checking the page when I'm bored.

Facebook is kind of like being my own papparazi--with my friends being fans--but is that healthy? Probably not.

I have a cool mousepad with my company's name on it. It connects to my workstation via a USB port and glows blue. It's kind of fun. My co-worker asked me if I had ever read the directions to the mousepad, which I had not. She said the directions had some issues in translation. So, I read them.

Excerpt from the instructions:
"Welcome to use aurora player's evil spirit cushion, please read a manual carefully, in order to understand in an all-round way and use a product correctly."

My other favorite:
"Open the top cover, remove the sponge hands and hold the organism both sides, there should not be damaging. Scratch to check the evil spirit cushion, otherwise should get in touch with local distributor."

I am a bit nervous that my mouse pad is an evil spirit cushion, but nothing bizarre has happened yet.

I am taking a spin class today.

The creator of spinning was a guy named Johnny G. I really don't know how facts like that get in my brain. Maybe from reading magazines, or perhaps Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

Whatever the case, I will be spinning. I kind of wish that the spinning class could be linked to a spinning wheel, and after all the hard work, each class member would get a bit a spun yarn to take home. It might be a neat twist on things.

...Or maybe the bikes could be hooked up to generators, and the electricity for the music and lights would be supplied based on amount of effort exerted by the class.

For now, I will just settle for calorie burn and wait for the freshly spun yarn and the generators.

Friday is here once again. I'm not the type of person that lives for Fridays, because there are so many other days in between. If I just lived for
Fridays, that would be cutting back my lifespan by a lot.

I enjoy Fridays, because it's sweet anticipation for rest, relaxation, and usually some fun. I've got some plans to visit a friend, workout, maybe watch some movies, eat, go to church, do some laundry, and just chill. Life really is so much like a box of chocolates.