They Tried To Make Me Go To Rehab (TooSoon?)

I am a self- professed blog stalker. I mean, one of my favorite things to do at night is to scroll though my list of friends' blogs and catch up on what everyone is up to. Or friends-of-friends blogs. Or sister's of friends-of-friends. I mean, really, it's kind of a problem.

It started out innocently enough, I would look at my friends' blogs - I mean, that isn't weird, right? I have links to their blogs on my blog so I was being pretty transparent about the whole stalker thing. But then. I was reading a friend's blog and happened to see in her bloglist two other girls that we went to college with. Now, I am not particularly friends with these girls, I mean, we are friendly but it's not like I am on their Christmas card list or anything. So I started reading their blogs. I rationalized it by the fact that we all went to school together (I even worked with one of them during college - so that's better, right?) so it wasn't so weird when I started perusing their blogs. And then, I happened to notice that one of them had a bloglist on her page and...during a fit of boredom...I started reading those blogs. What?! Those of you that are my close friends (because I know this blog has to generate it's fair share of blogstalkers itself) should not be too surprised by this, knowing my slight tendency to voyeurism. So all of sudden I find myself reading blogs of people I have never even met. Some of them live in different states! I rationalize it by saying, okay, so so-and-so may live in Texas (allegedly) and we have never met, but our boys (her oldest, my only) both seem to be on the same growth rate (as in non-growth) and I always enjoy her stories about shopping for clothes two age groups ago...they are so familiar..poor Nikos was just complaining when we were in Twain Harte (not that you would know we we in Twain Harte since I haven't blogged it yet) that he was wearing baby swim shorts. Of course, since they were 12-18 month I couldn't really argue it. Anyway.

I started coming to the realization that I had a problem on two recent instances. Instance #1 (which actually took place a little while ago): Taki and I were watching one of our tv shows...let's call it CSI (I think NY or Miami) and one of the actors on the show starts choking (due to shellfish allergies or something...obvs this is not the point of my story) and I say "OMG (well, I said the words because I think saying the acronym would be kinda weird)...that's my friend's husband!!!" and I'm all super excited like me and his wife have BFF heart necklaces or something. And Taki says "Really, who?" (since he pretty much knows all my friends, at least by name.) And that's where I say "well actually, I don't know her, I just read her blog." What?! Okay crazy. Instance #2: I'm scrolling through a bloglist on another friend's site and I stumble upon one about someone that recently got transferred to another country...say...Down Under. Again, anyone that knows me knows that I have an affinity for blogs that are set in the LA area or abroad. Long story short, I spend a decent amount of time on said individual's blog (how did he pull off this job transfer, and could it be something that I could do too?! ---not sure if it makes it more or less excusable that I was doing this while I was unemployed.) I get to a blog post at a bar in the city where the "main character" is cutting his going away cake with a sword & I realize "holy crap, I was at that party!" I had put together a happy hour at my previous job & we had ended up sharing a room with this guy's going away party - crazy coincidence, right? Fast forward to a birthday party where we are at the friend's house with the bloglist and I tell the story "as in 'how crazy is this?'. Fast forward again to another bday party at the friend's house and, in the midst of me mediating a firetruck power struggle between Nikos and another little boy the kid's father says to me "Hey, aren't you the blog stalker?" and yells to his wife that I am there. Great. Full on crazy.

So, what lessons have I learned? How am I changing my behaviors? I'm not! So I happen to know a few too many details about people I have never met - I get excited when they get proposed to in Disneyland, or have a third boy, or their serviceman husband comes home from the Middle East, or they move to Australia. I may be a loser, but at I am embracing it!