For those of you who are new to my postings, here’s what you should know about the way I write. This post will be a little like reading “disclaimers” for other web sites.  You know disclaimers…the stuff that we never read because it only scares us out of our sox?! So, buckle up, Buttercup, because here comes the scary stuff:

1. The dot-dot-dot: I like putting dots…after everything, including blog titles. This represents me thinking about what I’m about to write. For some reason, I only put 3 dots…Hmmm…

2. I take HUGE liberties with the English language. Why? Because it annoys English professors and I have a very twisted desire to annoy them. My posts give them an excuse to get out their red pens (which, if you ask me, is a fetish problem. See # 4.). The liberties include:

• Making up new words – I am particularly fond of making verbs into nouns and nouns into verbs. If Zuckerberg can do it, why not me?
• Writing like I’m talking to you in person – One friend said she could imagine me actually verbally saying my entire blog to her in her kitchen. Thus, I will refer to you as…you.
• Using abbreviations that no one else uses – or at least ones that annoy English professors.
• Using incorrect grammar – some sentences are better with a dangling preposition and it’s the way we speak in the U.S.
• Just being human – Thanks to the 70s, my brain cells are dying by the second.

3. Despite # 2, I am somewhat of a grammar “Nazi”. So, I do like m-w.com and I dislike dictionary.com. I have yet to earn anything less than an A on any formal paper I have written. Hard to believe after reading this, hunh?

4. Counselor-ese: My bachelor’s and my master’s are in Psychology. So, this means I’m prone to asking you those really pithy, open-ended questions that make some squirm. Honestly? They make me squirm, too. If you fall victim to the dreaded counselor-ese, swallow hard, put on your big kid’s undies and try to deal with it.

5. Mom-ese: I have 3 grown children and a plethora of “adopteds” (which I will soon explain) and so, I can’t seem to stop giving advice to people. This would be why I make a lousy counselor. (Counselors are just supposed to ask pithy, open-ended questions.) And yes, this tendency does spill over into my posts, unfortunately. I promise I will try to make it “nice mom” stuff. Please understand that any “spill over” is just what has worked for me…your journey is different from mine and what works for me may be absolutely awful for you. If so, stop following what I said, immediately, please! I want you to do what works for YOU! And please don’t hold me responsible for something that didn’t work for you…I repeat…our journeys are different and you may need to follow a different path to be a healthier, better you. 

6. Zuckerberg: I have a love-hate relationship with the creator of Facebook (Actually, I’m sure he does not even know I exist.) and I take all opportunities to “give him grief” about messing up a perfectly good web site (See # 2). But, honestly? He’s the reason I now have this blog going, so I do think the guy is the worst thing possible…a brilliant genius. I owe him a lot.

7. I am a Christian: I am blessed to know people from all walks of life and I do mean, BLESSED. But, this site will “lean” Christian.

8. I am a naturalized Texan, but Yankee by birth—I have lived in Texas for over 20 years and I love it. I know the proper conjugation of “y’all,” but I still struggle with why Texans do the things they do. That would probably explain why my Texan friends merely tolerate me most days and my Yankee friends disowned me long ago.

9. I am a city girl living in rural America. I have forgotten how to merge into six lanes of traffic at warp-speed, but I can’t wait for my town to get a Target. Expect whining about both.

10. I am not a morning person—however, I do realize that I’m in the minority on this one. So, I will try to faithfully post 3 mornings a week so you can delay reading the emails from your boss. However, don’t expect me to comment regularly on your comments until 2 pm my time. Who am I kidding? It will be 4 pm.

11. I am sarcastic. Usually, my sarcasm targets my own stupidity or Zuckerberg’s, but take everything I say here with a healthy dose of skepticism. If I offend you, just tell me. I promise to apologize. I hate upsetting people even more than I hate morning.

12. I have “health adventures.” If you’re missing my post for the day, it could be that I am in the ER/hospital having a new adventure. Fortunately, the ER trip usually yields a rather long, silly post about the adventure. Yes, I do joke about that. You can’t make this stuff up…trust me.

13. I have career ADD. I never met a career I did not like, except maybe for the one in college where I cleaned toilets in the women’s residence hall. *shivers*

14. That abbreviation thing: Here’s a rough key:

• FB – Facebook
• The oldest child – refers to the firstborn son
• The darling daughter (or DD) – refers to my one and only daughter or the middle child
• The youngest child/son – refers to my youngest son
• DSL – Darling Son-in-Law, aka my web guru
• Hubby – the man who has managed to put up with all of the above for over 30 years–he is my hero, in every sense of the word
• The Offspring – all 3 of my kids who really aren’t kids anymore
• Adopteds – The offspring’s friends. I consider them my kiddos, too, and I love and worry about them just as much as I worry about my own kiddos. They were some of the first to suggest I was a writer. I did not say they were sane.
• MIP –MaryAnnInProgress, or the web site.

15. Plethora – I have always used “$ 20” words. One of the DD’s faves is the word “plethora.” I use it so often that I don’t even realize I’m using it now. So, it’s just my way of giving you your word version of “Where’s Waldo?” for the day without the red-and-white-striped shirt abuse.

16. “And a partridge in a pear tree” – This is the MIP equivalent of “etc.” So much so, that I’m constantly running to the store for additional bird seed. Partridges eat more than you think. And in case Greenpeace is reading this, I do not own an actual partridge. See # 11.

17. No swearing allowed –I have used swear words in the past (Hello? I went to college.), but most of them curdle my latte now, so please don’t use them here.

18. The back porch – a hallowed place off the back of my home that transform lives magically at midnight. I don’t know how this happens, but the adopteds assure me it does.

19. Verbosity: If I have to explain that by now, we need a session on the back porch. Or…maybe you need to look up verbosity on www.m-w.com??? And this leads me to # 20.

20. Favorite beverage alerts: When a note is particularly long (like this one), I will warn you ahead of time, in case you want to read it when you have more time. How do I warn you? I say, “You might want to get your favorite beverage first.” If it’s going to be even longer, I say, “Maybe get two beverages.” If I say, “War and Peace was shorter,” then I’d visit the restroom first before starting to read it, if I were you.

21. I talk in “lists”: A healthy number of FB Notes (where I started blogging) were “Lessons Learned from…” posts and I wrote these in list style. Why? I have the most disorganized mind in the world and that is how they come out of my head. Anything I learn is rarely connected to anything else, explaining why it takes me so long to improve! Okay…it’s just my favorite excuse for not improving.

22. Point to Ponder Challenges: At the bottom of some of my posts, I may add a “Point to Ponder” Challenge. This means I hope you will “chew” on some aspect of that day’s blog post and start to figure out how your life could be different or maybe, even better, by actually implementing the PTPC. Yes, I actually expect you to try…I know it’s rapidly becoming a foreign concept in the U.S., but it’s a concept I’d like to see “resurface.” Will I ever know if you did??? Nope…remember…it’s your journey. But, if you succeed and you’d like to share that with me by all means, tell me about your awesomeness by sending me an email here or by adding a comment to the appropriate Point to Ponder post.

23. Word of the Week: Since I’m rather fond of the English language, I am going to make it my weekly mission to find a word that I have never encountered before and then let everyone guess at what the meaning might be…NO FAIR looking it up in the dictionary!  And yes, I will take a crack at it myself. My guess is that all of you will whip my fanny on these! And yes, you can make up a completely bogus definition just for fun.

24. I do have some serious thoughts…these revolve around when I should have myself committed, but if I think they might actually benefit someone else, I share them here. The FB “faithful” would probably warn you that sometimes a hanky is required for such posts.

25. I like alliteration…see # 22 and # 23.

So, can you handle the “disclaimer”?? 😀