I never get calls from scammers anymore. I used to get a lot of calls every day from various scammers saying they were going to turn off my electricity unless I paid them right now, they were going to arrest me unless I paid a warrant for my arrest, etc,etc. I used to just hang up on them, or ignore the calls, but that didn’t stop the calls. So you might be asking, what did finally stop the calls? It’s a little unconventional, but I messed with the scammers.

It actually started to be fun until all of the calls stopped. I am pretty sure there must be this giant red mark next to my phone number that says: Do NOT call her. She will keep you on the phone for 20 minutes. LOL. At first I would answer the phone and say something silly like, “911, what’s your emergency?” This would anger the scammers and they would yell at me and try to tell me their spiel anyway, and they kept calling back. I would repeat everything they said. Repeating everything they said really pissed them off. One guy got so angry at me I thought he was going to have a heart attack. But one day I got this brilliant idea to talk to this one particular scammer about himself.

This particular scammer spoke English really well, and at first I did my I usual repeating what he said etc, etc. But then suddenly, I asked him where he was calling me from. He hesitated and kept going with his spiel. I said, “No seriously! Where do you live? I mean you know by now I’m not going to pay you the $300 you’re asking me for.” He hesitated for a second and then he said,”I live in Lebanon. Where do you live?” Oh wait a minute, I thought these guys had our addresses and information. I asked him if he knew what country he was calling, and he told me that he just knew he was calling the United States, but that was all. So of course I didn’t tell him what city I live in, but I did tell him that I live in Southern California, and he was really exited by this and asked me if I ever go to the beach. We talked about California for a bit. Then I asked him if he was married and he said that he was not because he was only 30 years old. He ended up explaining that they all work in a call center and paid hourly as well as getting commission for everyone they scam. The more money they get out of people, the better. He told me that I had a nice voice and asked me if I’m hot. Haha! I asked him what it was like to live in Lebanon, and he said it was not that good, and this job was practically the only good job to have. The scammer wanted to know if he was going to be on YouTube. He asked me what I did for a living and was interested in the fact that I was a therapist. Then he asked if he could ever visit me. Suuuuure…..and finally he wanted to talk to my husband, so I handed the phone over to my husband who jumped right in and had a conversation with the guy. I kept him on the phone for 15 minutes before he said that his supervisor was walking over and giving him a look because he had been on the phone with me too long. He started whispering that he had to go, so we said goodbye. I think he got in trouble. He even told me his name which was Amal Lol.

The next scammer who called I immediately asked him his name. He hesitated and all of a sudden started tell me, “I love you! You’re hot! I want to marry you!!” I burst out laughing and we were both laughing. And no, it was not Amal. And after that I did not get any calls from scammers. Not a one. It’s been 2 years since I have gotten a scammer call other than the automated car warranty call, but even those have dwindled down. So if you want to get rid of scammers, ask them questions about their lives….that is sure to get you off of the scammer list. It worked for me.

I love to write. I always have. But I didn’t write anything for quite awhile because I had no time, and I had to write a lot of papers for school. I’m a therapist by trade, and because we have to write so many papers and presentations in school, I became burned out.

In 2019 I started this blog and wrote one or two things, and then flaked out. I didn’t know what to write. I thought that maybe I would write blog posts using my profession as a basis, but every time I started to write something all therapisty- like it was b-o-r-i-n-g. I put myself to sleep, so I quit.

I write a lot of things about my daily life, weird experiences, etc on Facebook, and my friends seem to love these posts. People started telling me that I needed to write a blog and put these Facebook posts in the blog, so here I am. I think it’s going better than when I was trying to be serious, but who knows because I don’t think anyone has even seen any of my blog posts yet. LOL. And I don’t know if strangers will like my stuff, or do my friends all like my posts because they can relate to them. I guess we will find out.

So what are my Facebook posts like you might ask. I seem to have a fair number of weird encounters with people in stores, etc. I think it’s because I’m observant. Or is it that I attract weird? Maybe a little of both. I like to try to poke fun at things too. For example, spellcheck on phones really tries to get you to not use cuss words. Fuck is duck, bitch is botch, etc. And don’t even get me started about Facebook and how it tries to sensor your words, or decipher what you are trying to say and it it’s hurtful. I cannot tell you how many times I have been in Facebook jail because Facebook decided that I called someone a name or what I said was a terrorist threat. I once merely said that we need to blow up someone’s post with comments, and bam! Facebook jail. Apparently even just using those two words together to make an innocent comment is offensive. There was a time when I was commenting to my friend that it seemed very white trash-like, not calling anyone white trash, and off to jail I went. One of my friends couldn’t believe that you can’t even put those two words together, so they simply posted “White trash” as their status, and off to jail they went. I also talk about my former neighbor quite a bit because they were rather strange. One of my former neighbors is a drug dealer who used to do some really interesting things. I have plenty of material, so I am sure I will be busy writing for quite awhile. And then I have new stuff that is always happening too, so stay tuned.

I got unfriended on Facebook again..by several people at once this time. I have an app that alerts me when I’ve been unfriended and there they were, the people who unfriended me. A few of the were people I honestly didn’t know that well, but one of them was someone I did know fairly well so I thought it was odd. I messaged the one person I do know well and asked them what happened. They were surprised that it showed they had unfriended me and said that they did not unfriend me. They immediately sent me a friend request. I believe them when they say that they did not unfriend me because Facebook does weird things, and this has happened in the past with a really good friend.

So I put out a post on Facebook asking if someone had hacked my page and posted something offensive, and told the story of how multiple people had unfriended me. Was it the posts about my dogs? Or maybe the posts about my horse are offensive? Sometimes I artfully use the word fuck in my posts, and I know there are people who hate that word, but I hadn’t posted anything like that for awhile. It was perplexing.

Friends started to comment on the post. Most people were saying that my posts are funny or cute, and they couldn’t imagine someone having a legitimate reason to unfriend me. I mean, you don’t like my post, just scroll on past, because trust me, there are times I do a lot of scrolling on Facebook. And then one person who is more of an acquaintance comments,”It’s probably because you’re annoying.” And I started laughing. I replied with laughing emojis, and they became miffed and said that I’m not that funny. I invited them to unfriend me, but they said they liked some of my stuff, and they liked hearing about my dogs, my memes are funny, so they’re not unfriending me. I offered to unfriend them, but they didn’t like that at all. I found it interesting that they made the comment that they made. They could have just keep quiet, but they felt compelled to say something. And honestly, I probably am annoying at times.

Other friends started to go after this other person who was slightly rude, but I stopped it and said that I am not upset, and that they are entitled to their opinion. I mean it kind of stung, but I also know that they were trying to be sarcastic. Sarcasm is ok with me if it comes from a good place. You just cannot take Facebook too seriously.

The mystery remains though, did all of these people unfriend me at once? They didn’t know each other. It’s weird, and I am not going to ask each one of them if they actually unfriended me. It’s just not that important.

I went to Vons today to do my weekly shopping. Lately I have been going to Trader Joe’s, but it’s such a hassle to go there because of the parking lot, and Vons is a 1/4 mile from my house, so I went to Vons. Shoulda known better.

I tried to pick a time of day when the store would be less crowded. I got in line behind another woman who had a lot more in her cart than I did, and I started to unload my groceries. All of a sudden 15 people with one or two items each got in behind me. The woman in front of me and I let 3 people go ahead of us. Some of the other people in line went to other check stands, but others got in behind me. The self checkout was wide open but no one wanted to go over there. Ok fine, but it’s your fault if you’re here for awhile.

There was a man behind me who started to make passive aggressive comments about how we’re not letting people with fewer items go ahead. I turned around and nicely said: “We already allowed a few people to go ahead. If we keep doing that, we’ll never get home. Self checkout is open.” Couldn’t help myself. The man looked away and muttered something, probably called me a Bitch is my guess. I ignored him. The checker told the people behind me that self checkout is open and will be a lot faster. One person told the checker that they’re just trying to help the checkers keep their jobs by refusing to use self checkout. The checker laughed and said to not worry, no one is going to be replaced by self checkout..” I made it through the line, and as I left I turned around and told Mr. Passive Aggressive that I hope he has a blessed Sunday. He just looked at me. The checked smiled at him and told him, “You can’t blame other people for holding you up. Self checkout is open.” LOL! I sometimes just don’t understand people.

I’m going back to doing my grocery shopping at 7:00 am when the store is vacant…although I will probably get stuck behind someone with 400 coupons. And I will not complain about it.

I’m a therapist and my office is in a quaint little town where there are restaurants, speciality shops, etc. My office is located in the medical building at the edge of town across from a popular restaurant.

Normally people are friendly and chatty, and it’s a really good vibe. but every now and then I run across some interesting characters. The other day I was getting out of my car. I had parked near the restaurant and was pulling things out of my car when a woman approached me and asked me what time the restaurant opened and said that she wants to place an order to go. I know I had a confused look on my face and I told the woman that I wasn’t entirely sure, but that I thought the restaurant opened around 11:00 am because I had seen people on the patio at that time of day. The woman looked at me like I was nuts and said,”You work in the restaurant, so how come you don’t know what time it opens!.” I laughed a little and told her that she must have me confused with someone else because I don’t work in the restaurant. The woman huffed at me and said, “Then why in the hell are you parked right here if you don’t work over there?” So I told the woman that my office is right over there, and I pointed to the office building. So the woman says,”Oh yeah, and what DO you do?” Honestly I hate answering this question because when I tell people I’m a therapist I can sometimes get weird reactions, and I never know what kind of reaction I will get. So I told the woman,”I’m a therapist”. The woman crinkled up her nose and asked me what kind of therapist, so I told her that I’m a Marriage and Family Therapist. She crinkled her nose again, looked at me and said,”Well, you look like a f&*king waitress to me!” I laughed out loud and she asked me what I’m laughing at, and my laughter seemed to piss her off. So I told her that I just didn’t know that people look like a waitress or that they look like anything. The woman became agitated and screeched at me, “Well I bet you think that you’re all high and mighty!! You don’t know anything! And YOU look like a waitress!!” I had pulled my bag out of my car by then and I was making my way to my office, backing away from the woman, and I was laughing pretty hard at this point because the entire conversation was so ridiculous. So I told the woman,”Well, I hope that the rest of your day is a good one, and that the restaurant opens soon!” And as I walked up the stairs of the building she looks up at me and says, “You know what! F&*K YOU BITCH!” And I laughed and went into my office still kind of snickering about the incident. Because what else can ya do!

I have never blogged before so forgive my transgressions as I start out. I love to write and share my thoughts, and I do it a lot on Facebook. People always tell me: “You should write a blog since you have so much to say”. Is that their way of telling me that my posts are too long? Or that I’m annoying? Maybe……Some people tell me I’m funny and that is why I should blog. So here I am, giving blogging a try to see what happens.

Something that you should know about me is that I try to see the lighter side of things…….usually. But I can be dark and angry too. It’s a Scorpio thing. I am also a marriage and family therapist but I am hiding my identity because the purpose of this blog is not to become famous (ha,ha), or to have clients and colleagues know it’s me. The purpose is to share my thoughts and also perhaps sometimes share something therapist-like, but not be defined by the whole therapist thing.

I admit I spent quite a bit of time setting this blog up. It took weeks for me to think of a title that I liked, or a tag line that I thought was halfway decent. Choosing the picture was another feat. It wasn’t easy to get started. I almost gave up, but I kept coming back because this is something that I was determined to do. I had to start this to prove to myself that I could follow through, because in the past I flaked out on things a lot. I procrastinated. I quit. I even quit college (Twice) for stupid reasons. I used to never finish anything. Ever. I used to piss off a lot of people. And then one day, I quit procrastinating. I started to follow through no matter what. I finished college. I got my Master’s degree and became a therapist at the age of 40. And then……..things really changed. I was on a roll. I quit procrastinating and I followed through, and finished what I started. Even though some things take me longer than others, I still finish what I start, and I never used to. Ever. Some people ask me my secret. I really don’t know why I was able to just stop procrastinating, with important things anyway, because I am really good at procrastinating about cleaning the house.

Some people actually try to bring me down and say that I have a Type A personality, and that I’m too anal. No, I don’t, and I’m not, I just follow through. There is a difference. I know that some people look at my progress and my small successes with a scowl and disdain, maybe even envy, jealousy, but I have learned that is all about them, and it has nothing to do with me. I often wonder what one of the people who tell me derogatory things would do if I actually did what they said. What would happen if I quit working, shaved my head, quit taking care of myself……what would happen? I am betting that those same people who try to bring me down would then tell me I’m a loser. I guess some people are never satisfied. Lol. So, I trudge on, working on myself every day, trying new things, ignoring the negative comments and viewpoints. No one really knows me. No one really knows what I’ve been through. Because if they did, they would know how hard it was for me to just write this little blog.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton