The Summer Epidemic

There's a summer epidemic that's sweeping the nation, possibly sweeping the entire world. It's not the Zika virus, or any other illness that you would catch from a insect bite. It's one borne out of pure stupidty. 

Everyday it seems we're reading that another parent or guardian has left a child in a blistering hot car to die a very excruciating death.

Just three nights ago in Kershaw County, SC, 46 year old Melony Peters was arrested for leaving her car unattended with a 16-month old child and a dog inside the car while she was grocery shopping. Fortunately, a lady was able to unlock the car and get the baby out of the car, take the baby inside the grocery store, and call 911. The baby was drenched with sweat. When the police located Peters and questioned her, she stated that she "had a lot on her mind and forgot the child was in the car." The baby was taken into protective care by the Department of Social Services and the dog was turned over to Kershaw County Special Services. Not all cases have a positive outcome.

Earlier this month, a mom in Mississippi left her two year old child in her car while she went to work. She had forgotten to drop the child off at daycare before work, but get this: she remembered to go pick the child up from daycare. Several points come to mind over this. First, when she approached  her car after work, did she not see her deceased child, still strapped into her car seat? Second, if the mother could remember the routine of picking the child up from daycare, why couldn't she remember to drop the child off? And third, how are some ruled an accident and others aren't?

When the story of the Mississippi mom first started making it's rounds on social media, I read the comments that people were leaving, which is something I need to stop doing because some of the idiots just infuriate me, but one of them really ticked me off. She said something to the effect of "if you have a baby in the backseat, take off your left shoe and leave it in the backseat so that when you get out you'll realize it's in the backseat with your child."

My thoughts on that are IF YOU'RE THAT STUPID, DO NOT REPRODUCE!

Remember the dad in Georgia who left his two year old in the car? He caused a big argument on my Facebook page without even knowing it. A former friend was defending him and was even going as far as to say  that she could see her boyfriend leaving her kids in the car. I told her that maybe she should rethink that relationship. She blocked me.

In closing I'd just like to say that it seems awfully odd to me that you never really hear of kids being left in cars in the winter and freezing to death. Hmm, I wonder why?

You've heard of fair weather friends? Well...

I have a story for you. Grab some popcorn, wine, vodka, Resse's Pieces or the snack of your choice.

I had (had, you see) this friend. We'll call her S. A and I had been friends for about six years. We were close friends and had even became "sisters" at one point. A lives out of state and has visited me twice.

In the past year, things started getting nuts with her. I stopped hearing from her on a regular basis. It got to the point that I only heard from her when him she needed to bitch about the current boyfriend. (This was the first current boyfriend of the year, not the current current guy.) she would go on and on about how he had wronged her in one way or another and me, trying to be a good friend, would sympathetically listen and then always agree that he had just done her wrong. And of course I always told her what a great person she is and tell her everything she needed to hear to make her feel better. Even though she says she sugar coats nothing, she needs everything sugar coated for her. 

However, if I needed to talk to her about an issue I was having either she didn't have time or it soon got turned around to her current problem. The opposite of a fair weather friend.

Since then, she has gone through 3 (I think, it's hard to keep up) guys in the past year. That's really none of my business except for the fact that she told me in one of our last conversations back in the fall last year that she wasn't going to date anyone for a while and that she was gonna work on herself. Ok. Good.

Near the end of last year, I shared a picture on Facebook that said something like "in the past year you've posted more pictures on Instagram with the caption me and my better half. You must be an extra large pizza." I thought it was funny but honestly had not one single person in mind. Apparently, S was feeling guilty because she was the first to comment with "you must be talking about me." Well, honey, if the shoe fits!

So, S, (and since she's blocked me on all social media I doubt that she'll see this) I'm not sugar coating anything anymore:

1.  Honey, you need some serious help. You say one thing and do the exact opposite. You're gonna stop dating and work on yourself so you go through 2 or 3 more men after that.

2.  No one believes anything that comes out of your mouth anymore because of past lies. Who knows what lies you're telling at this very moment. 

3.  Kiss my ass.