Midland.

I finally found one of the ignorant people who write hateful messages to people doing their job. Nathan and I decided to go get some ice cream this evening. And instead of going home since it was still daylight, we parked in a tiny little parking lot a couple blocks from our house that is in front one of the Dow entrances. Its surrounded by the beautiful green grass and freshly blooming trees. So we stopped and ate our ice cream. I notice over my left should a middle aged man staring at us. I stared back for a second. Then I opened my door and said, "Can I help you?" He didn't respond as he kind of stomped over. He went behind our car and read our license plate and said OK. I've got all I need. I said, "Excuse me?" Then he said, as he continued to stomp away, "We've got high school and college students coming over here rolling dope." And he said it in a very accusatory tone. "MY HUSBAND AND I ARE EATING ICE CREAM!" I half shouted back. He ignored me still stomping like he was ready to go call the cops on us. "DO YOU WANT TO SEE MY ICE CREAM???? ITS RIGHT HERE!" as I held my ice cream out the door.

Now I understand his "concern." He appeared to live probably an equal distance as we live to the little lot. But we were sitting in our nice, normal car in the daylight, eating ice cream, with a car full of car seats (not that people with kids are rolling dope.) That was an awfully big assumption. Well I'm not going to let that ******* (fill in the blank) try to report me to the police. So I went home and called the police (had to leave a message with the shift manager.) I told them that my husband and I were enjoying the scenery eating our ice cream and some man began to harass us and accuse of rolling dope. And I told them my husband and I didn't want to have our plates reported as possibly rolling dope when we were simple eating ice cream. I left my name and phone number. I'd absolutely love it if the police had come and searched our car... better yet while that jerk was watching. They might find the four dollars I currently have in my purse. Or maybe they'd find an overflowing diaper bag. They'd also find some tampons in the glove box. It would be absolutely hilarious.

The only explanation I can find is my hair. OK... I'll give you the very short version. I let the intern Amanda mess with my hair. She is technically a beauty school drop out. One thing led to another and my hair was red. It was bad. The only way to counter the red and get back some kind of normal hair color was to go dark. I don't want to say black, but it is like Nathan's hair dark. It doesn't look bad... after all it actually matches my eye brows. And we're not upset about it. Its just hair. BUT I think it does make me appear to be a bit more edgy. So the only reasonable explanation is simple the hair.

Ha. Maybe this evening's incident is part of the reason Midland, MI isn't an easy place to make friends.

OH and on a lighter note... I finally got out in the yard and did some garden type of work. And I finally 'met' our neighbor. When I say met, I mean I said, "Hi. How are you?" All I got back in return was a weird look. And when some people from a couple houses over walked by, I said, "Hi!" And again, I got back that same weird look. Not even an attempt to return the Hi. Not even a awkward smile. Nothing. I'm not going to lie... I'm jealous of Shaminder (the Hearst Fellow who's been with Nathan at the paper for about 8 months) as he has left Midland and moved on to his next Hearst endeavor. I don't know what I would do if we didn't have such great bosses: Nathan's boss Ryan and his wife Angie, Anya's family, and the Flicks, as well as our friends Marcia and Charles... and the other newspaper staffers. That is the extent of our Midland social circle.