Joyful Mayhem

I used to give a lot of my time to Social Media (facebook in particular). More than I’d like to admit, really.   I gave it my time, my attention and oddly, some of my heart. I’ve really loved being able to check in with people throughout the day. Some are people I see regularly, and others are people I wouldn’t be able to stay in touch with as often without it. I’ve heard people denounce social media proclaiming its evils and how we need to have authentic, face-to-face encounters. I do have authentic face-to-face relationships, but I also enjoy the connections I’ve built through social media.  Some of those connections, I’ve built into “in-person” friendships. This has been the case, in varying forms, since I joined Facebook almost 8 years ago. Recently, I’ve realized that more and more of the personal stuff I’ve always looked forward to reading has disappeared.  Now, I log in to see endless quiz results such as “What Kind of Tree Are You” (I guess Barbara Walters was really on

Ahhh, April 1.  Light showers or sunny skies, who knows what Mother Nature may bring. Regardless, I know what I will bring and that's lots and lots of pranks to my family. I have loved pranks since I was young.  I remember  going up to my mom, with my mouth full of air, and having her squeeze my checks. Sometimes I would put a small drop of water in the corner of my mouth to try and trick her into thinking it was full of water. No dice. She would still squeeze the air. One day, I filled my mouth full of water, wiped it dry and went to my mom as usual.  She squeezed! The joy! The exhilaration! It was a feeling I loved, and thankfully, she responded positively. Later, I would join friends prank calling after school. We would randomly pick people out of the phone book and ask the old standby, "is your refrigerator running?" among other silly things. We thought we sounded so official and mature, but obviously we were deluded by the mischievous fun we were h