Springtime Out The Van Window

People whose mood is affected by the weather terrify me. I can understand how sunshine makes one feel like, ya know, going outside and enjoying the warm weather, but I cannot wrap my head around people who feel the need to: A.) Announce this on Facebook. B.) Let it determine how the rest of their day will go. C.) Write blogs about it. And D.) Bake me cookies.

FOR EXAMPLE…Once upon a time I read a status update from one of my 17,000 Facebook friends that read:

“It is such a sunny day out…and I am stuck working…today SUCKS!”

This was then followed by a Facebook Frowney Face, which I refuse to re-enact. Dear random Facebook friend, please get over your make-believe Seasonal-Anxiety-Disorder, which is just a fancy way of saying you sometimes wish it would rain less, and get off of Facebook at work, or I am going to FIRE YOU.

FOR ANOTHER EXAMPLE…Another random Facebook friend mentioned they were:
“Sooooo happy Spring is here! Blue skies, birds chirping and flowers blooming! Today’s going to be a great day!”

Because Eastern Oregon University has an enrollment of 15 students, I inevitably saw this person walking on campus and thought I would offer a friendly “Hey, we are not really friends in real-life but I friend requested you on the internet, so I am going to acknowledge your existence today” head-nod. I made eye contact, locked on for a few seconds, and gave the upward chin tilt like someone just tugged at the back of my hair, and I was greeted by a large smile and waive. It was a rather pleasant exchange, considering my head-nod gesture to warm smile received ratio is somewhere in the negatives, which is a fancy way of saying when people see an awkward 6’7 person smile at them they automatically assume I am hungry. Which I am.
THEN…days later, the same person updated their Facebook status to something like—or exactly like, this:

“Where’d the sun go? DAMN WEATHER! Make up your mind! Everything is gray. Like my soul.”

Of course, like any oxygen-breathing human, I laughed hysterically at this, assuming it was made to be a joke. That day, I saw this person walking on campus, and EVERYONE knows that if you head-nod at someone the day prior, and see them again within 4 days, you have no choice but to head-nod at them. If you do not acknowledge their presence, it’s like beating up their younger sister and blaming it on the family dog.

I don’t beat up young children, and I have a fondness for dogs, so I head nodded, like anyone ever does, awkwardly, exaggeratedly, and in a way that makes you look like you are trying to be a lot cooler than you actually are.

Except, this time my head nod was not received by a courteous smile. I thought I’d be in for a friendly waive, as I saw this persons hand creep up just past waist level, and I was preparing myself to waive back—until I realized the hand they were raising was grasping an empty Mountain Dew bottle, full of a dark brown, foamy liquid.

Facebook Friend had a wad of chewing tobacco the size of Rhode Island wedged between their lower gums and bottom lip, and loudly spat down the Mountain Dew spout, adding another drop to the festering pool of saliva and warm tobacco residue. Politely, this person’s friend decided to spit their tobacco saliva a few feet away from my immediate path.

I considered nodding to him to thank him for his courtesy, but then I realized he was wearing camouflage and I couldn’t find him, and if people saw me nodding at invisible people, they would never nod at me again. Then, I looked up in the sky and realized it was a bit overcast, the sun was nowhere to be found and it felt a bit more like Fall than Springtime. Damn you weather gods. There was also a cloud that vaguely resembled a middle finger in the sky, then another formation that looked like a man getting decapitated, so this could have just been a bad Omen. Either way, people that are nice when the weather is should be removed from Facebook, or at the very least carry around signs that say, “Don’t talk to me, I am incapable of determining my mood, so I let Al Roker do it for me.”

In other related news, I have decided carrying a re-usable bag to Safeway is apparently an open invitation to fellow shoppers to please publically critique the items in my bag.

I was in the check-out line yesterday, and a middle aged woman began talking to me…which usually ends in an exchange of phone numbers and a rendezvous, seeing a movie like “Julie and Julia.”

BUT NOT TODAY! Today, the middle-aged-women, MAW for sake of brevity, told me that the broccoli I bought was only 50 cents more expensive than asparagus, a far superior vegetable in her opinion.

I laughed…because that is HILARIOUS. Everyone knows asparagus makes your pee smell funny and broccoli makes you grow chest hair.

She didn’t appreciate the laughter and responded in a way that made me feel both awkward and like I might have just broken some unwritten grocery-shopping-code of conduct.

“I am just trying to help you save money. If you shopped smarter, you’d save money. I notice you also only got one jug of milk when it is two for $3.”

“That’s cuz I only needed one jug. But thanks…I’ll remember that for next time,” I responded, trying to be diplomatic and not a sarcastic jerk.

“Well…these deals don’t stick around forever. Next time they will be much more expensive,” said the pessimistic, nosy, MAW.

“Okay,” I said, staring at the tabloids. Oprah is pregnant with a Martains baby.
“So…are you making a stir fry?” MAW was not done.

I took a deep breath as to restrict myself from exploding, but I turned green, jumped on the cashier counter, and started beating her relentlessly with a sack of yams.

Just kidding. After examining my bag of carrots, broccoli, celery, water-chestnuts and snap peas, I just made a mute smile towards her, winked with my left eye and said, “Nope…I am making pancakes.”

She didn’t find it as humorous as I had anticipated, so she stared at me straight faced, which presented a potentially awkward remaining three minutes in the check-out line.

Thankfully, being entirely socially savvy, I scrambled for more material.

“Hey…did you know Oprah is giving birth to a Martian baby?” I said.

“Is she REALLY!? I heard about that somewhere,” MAW said.
Problem solved.