Living Out Loud volume 21: Back to school

There are many things about Facebook that chap me (deleting breastfeeding photos, making privacy changes without sufficient info, karnflabbit FARMVILLE!), but I still find myself checking it every single day. I admit I check it more often than Twitter these days. And while there are updates from co-workers and close friends, there are also updates from people I never thought I'd hear from again. A girl I shared science with just finished a triathalon (!) this weekend and posted pictures of a play date with her five (!) kids. Another girl who was always stylishly dressed and coiffed in high school just finished 24 pushups using the iPhone 100 pushups app. The picked-on guy who never had a girlfriend is married and soon to be a dad. Personally, I love getting these updates.

But this isn't about Facebook. This is about the difference between high school and who we are now. Some of these people I couldn't stand in 1992 and now I'm cooing over their baby pictures. Is each of us very different now? Would we find the high school version of ourselves pretty insufferable?

Tell us about your high school self. In the Breakfast Club version of your school were you the brain, the athlete, the basket case, the princess or the criminal? Are there people you would love to find from high school? Others you'd love to forget? How do you compare to what you were then? Would your English teacher recognize you? Would he or she be proud of you?

Details include:

• Write something personal about yourself using the previous paragraphs as a guideline. Do not feel that you have to address each prompt above. The spirit of this project is to share something about yourself; I'm just throwing out ideas.

• Once you have completed your entry and posted it, please email me the link at genie [at] inabottle [dot] org. Remember, if you don't email me, I'm likely to forget to include you in the recap!

• If you do not have a blog to host your story, you can email me the story directly and I will add it here as a guest post giving you credit. The more the merrier!

• The due date for entries is Sunday, October 3rd (the first Sunday of the month) at 5pm Eastern.

• Once I have collected all the entries, I will post a wrap-up to list them all and announce a winner. The winner will receive some sort of prize to be determined but all participants will receive fame and glory and a link on our Living Out Loud blogroll.

Bonus points for embarrassing photos!

Recap of Living Out Loud volume 20: You won't read this anywhere ...

I nearly called this month's theme "No Sex in the Champagne Room" after Chris Rock's song. But I'll just link to the YouTube video and let you enjoy that on your own time. Grace's You won't read this anywhere ... #5 made me laugh out loud. And I had to look up what za'tar was. So I think some new food experiments are in my future.

Rachel's Aunt Rachel. I admit to feeling in awe of your dedication to writing monthly. I suck at mailing letters. I'm lucky if I can mail the occasional bill that's not able to be paid electronically.

Candice's To My Dear Apartment Ugh, the bottle washing! I sort of embraced it like a therapeutic time to just zen out and scrub baby bottles.

SuziCate's When The Tables Turn I'd say the ability of someone to handle camping says a lot about their tenacity in many things.

Peggy's Living by the Rules One of our neighbors used to make everyone go in the basement when there was a thunderstorm! My brother would go over to play and if it started thundering he'd get annoyed and walk home because he didn't want to sit in the basement.

Erin's Measure twice, cut once I have a theory that there is a sewing muse and it's dangerous to try to sew if you don't feel her watching over you. I have sewing sleeves on upside down and dresses inside out without the muse's help.

Megan's The Tag on the Quilt I think the reading is my favorite one. I don't read enough. Then again I'm not sure if there is an "enough".

Ruth's Number your page from one to ten ... Wonderful list and many are ones I could have written myself. I'm impressed about the napkins (we always forget napkins and end up using paper towels in a pinch). And my father hates the "no problem" response too.

and my own Now I just need a megaphone ...

So many of these entries pleased me this month it was hard to pick a winner! And even better I feel like I learned a lot more about what makes some of you "tick". So that's always great. But I decided that Erin should win this month. For one thing, I'm a sucker for new participants and she jumped in with both feet. And with only one rule she gave a great example of something that frustrated her as well as fodder for personal folklore. I can imagine many future projects where someone would say "this isn't going to be like the t-shirt quilt is it?" At least that's how our family works.

So congrats, Erin, and welcome to the esteemed ranks of LOLers. It's a fun little project and we hope you stick around for future ones. Erin will receive a $25 gift certificate to Amazon as her prize.

Sometimes I let the "pressure" of LOL get to me. Picking a "good" topic, writing something and then doing the recap. But this month was super duper fun while still being a personal topic. Maybe it's residual joy from BlogHer, but I'm feeling pretty stoked about LOL and look forward to posting the theme for volume 21 very soon!

Now I just need a megaphone ...

Yesterday as we drove back from lunch, Rich and I saw several men on a local street corner yelling. It was hard to understand what they were saying, despite one of them having a megaphone, but Rich got a piece of their literature and it was something about some old white guy proselytizing and how we shouldn't miss it. There were four young white guys in jeans and t-shirts sharing the megaphone and clapping their hands in agreement with whomever was talking. I remarked to Rich that I couldn't think of anything about the Lord I needed to share with others on this beautiful afternoon, particularly at that volume. But in light of this month's Living Out Loud theme, I did realize there are lots of other things I'd be happy to share via megaphone with the general public.

So if you see me on a street corner in the near future, listen for some of these gems. I need to make a pamphlet to hand out with them.

Animals Cats do not belong on any surface that serves food. Cats will most likely not agree to this rule, but tend to at least do it when you're not around. Your job is to ignore any cat hairs you may see on the dining room table while they agree to run away feigning shame if you catch them in the act. This charade is a social contract between me and all cats.

Never break up a dog fight with your body because invariably you will end up the worst for wear.

Always try to space out your pets as much as possible in age. Sure they may play together great when they're both 2, but they're also going to become feeble and incontinent around the same time too.

Household The vacuum cleaner cord should be wound in a figure 8 pattern. It may take up more space on the winders but will not be twisted when you remove it.

Top sheets get tucked in even though the first thing you'll do is rip them loose once you're in bed. They also go "pretty side down" so that when you fold the top sheet over it's pretty.

Pillow cases go on pillows so that the tags are covered up. Pillows go on the bed so that the pillow opening faces outwards. No one should ever have to roll over in the night and be faced with open pillow mouth!

Food and Dining Sugar free pancake syrup is not food. No one actually prefers it over real syrup and it's just another tool for people to feel like they're cheating the system versus just not drowning your food in syrup.

Always be kind to your waitstaff. They are alone with your food.

If your service is so bad that you consider leaving less than a 10% tip, you should have just left the restaurant. Shorting that server a tip is not going to teach anyone anything.

Cantaloupe, tomatoes, butter and jelly are always better at room temperature.

Human Nature If you have a problem with everyone, it's most likely not everyone. It's you. (I learned this from my ex-mother-in-law.)

Lying puts a price on your character, generally one you're not willing to spend. (I learned this from Mr. Laws in middle school.)

Somebody's gotta go first. (This I borrowed from my old boss Harry at his retirement party.)

Anything worth having is a lot of trouble. (My grandmother said this about watermelon, but it stands true.)

Most people think they're a good driver and have a good sense of humor.

"I'm sorry if you feel that way" is not an apology. Stop trying to be right and just apologize.

I really enjoyed making this list and these are just the ones I could think of in the last few days. Maybe I'll post more rules as I think of them. That's probably what Twitter was designed for anyways.