othersomethings.com

This is a two parter. The first part, I will give you a little history. The second part, I will tie it in with the events of today.

Part 1.

Several years ago, (ok…more like 8-9 years ago) my sister Harmony took part in a little impromptu Q&A on stage at church. Think “Bill Cosby and kids say the you get the picture.” I’m going to guess she was 5. When asked to spell Jesus, she (ironically) blurted out “J-E-L-L-O!!!” And in the next round, was asked to tell a story. Her version of “The Three Bears” went like this:

“Momma bear was outside in the garden, and baby bear came out and asked her ‘what are you doing?’ and mama bear said ‘something else’ and baby bear was like ‘ok’….” story continues in a similar nonsensical fashion.

The fact that Harmony thought “Something Else” was an acceptable answer to the question “what are you doing” was beyond hysterical to me. It made me ponder the phrase at great length.

Shortly thereafter, I received as a gift my first and only pet. A frog. I named him “Something Else.” Something Else had a full life that ended abruptly after a freak “broken arm” incident that may or may not have been my fault and which no vet or pet shop seemed interested in helping with.

In the following years, I used the “Something Else” name as a screenname online. Turned out there weren’t too many online sites where that “name” wasn’t already used, so I morphed it into “othersomethings” and thus…we arrive where we are today.

Part 2.

Today, as a surprise, Shannon took me out to lunch to the new(ish) place on the Corner, T.R. Frogs. We’d gotten a pizza from there before, and decided it was OK enough to try their $5 lunch special. Having a toddler, we received the kids menu with crayons for coloring and what not.

Towards the end of coloring in the frog on the front, I flipped the menu over to see that the back had a list of “Frog Facts.” I was curious. (You’re thinking…”I see what you did there. you were coloring instead of Ella. nice.” I’m thinking back “heck yes.”)

Reading down the facts, I got to this one. I’ve highlighted it in red, you can’t miss it.

WOW.

Just…WOW WOW WOW. How close CAN you be to Cuba without actually BEING in Cuba? Are we talking the line between international waters? Are we talking floating on the tide and just BARELY not touching the sand? Are we talking…HOVERING?!

I need to meet this frog. And is it literally THE smallest frog? Like the 1 individual smallest ever measured? Or is it the entire species of smallest frogs? And if they’re the smallest, how small are they? AND WHERE THE HECK ARE THEY ON THE COAST OF CUBA?!? This would have been on national geographic by now FOR SURE.

This gets better. I continue reading the “fact sheet” and notice that one fact states that the largest frog in the world can be up to 10 pounds. Then the very last fact, on the bottom of the page, says the largest frog in North America can be up 12 pounds. Hmmmmm…

So I made the necessary notes and dropped it off with the blond hostess at the front desk. As I pointed out the whole “distance from Cuba” problem she started laughing. So I hope things get righted. And I hope the print run on those kids menus wasn’t too extravagant.

And so, I have finally talked about frogs on my blog that was in a round-about way named after a beloved frog.

The End.

First impressions of people are almost always wrong.

Granted, some folks claim (and rightly so) to have good instincts about others, especially upon first meetings, but that could be chalked up to a number of things that don’t necessarily mean you’re first impression was correct.

That isn’t really my point though. I was thinking about how informative it would be if we knew what others first impressions of us were.

If, when I met someone, instead of them saying “Hi, my name is…nice to meet you” they said “Hi. You look like _______ type of person.” or “Hello, are you feeling very _______ right now?” based on their initial impression of me.

Or even 5 minutes after meeting someone new, and talking to them about normal chit-chatty stuff, what would they say about you that they’d learned in that 5 minutes?

I think we would learn A LOT about ourselves if we knew that information.

None of us are the sum of what we present in meeting someone for the first time. We’re on good behavior (usually) with polite greetings and nothing terribly deep shared. But the shallow surface things we share are still a part of us, and are a part of what that person sees upon meeting us. Sometimes it’s a “Nice day, isn’t it?” which tells you nothing about the person other than that they are enjoying the day, and are in an optimistic mood. Sometimes upon greeting, a joke is shared, which tells you that person appreciates a light-hearted encounter and also a little about either their interests or their particular brand of humor.  Sometimes they respond to a “how’s your day?” with “not to bad.” or “so-so.” which I find myself saying often enough, and it makes me wonder 1. am I just saying that cause I don’t want to commit to a good or bad day? and 2. does that person now think I’m a debbie downer?

I can think of a specific instance of this, a guy at the grocery store checkout always has this conversation with me:

“How was your weekend?”

“Not to bad.”

followed with either an “Oh?” (waiting for me to say “well, my daughter was sick” or “yeah, just doing chores, etc.”) OR he asks…”Do anything fun?”

And to the fun question, I almost always reply “not really.” without thinking about it, because who has time to inventory their weekend while typing in your debit PIN?

Except last time he asked me this, I actually paused and thought. Yes, I did do something fun. I had some REALLY GOOD PIZZA. So I told him that, and it turned into a conversation that lasted several minutes.

Because I actually thought about it that time. And it’s completely possible that he remembered me every time he asked me about my weekend before (although I doubt it), but now…he knows me because of the pizza conversation, and voila. I left a good “first” impression.

I really wish I could say I’ve left good first impressions with most people I meet daily. But I know that’s not true. And I wish I could hear what those actual first impressions are, because there is nothing like seeing yourself in a mirror for correcting yourself.

I have more thoughts on this, but it gets tangent-y so I guess I’ll end my thought here.

Do you remember your first impressions of me? (blood relations excepted.)  For educational purposes, I’d be interested in hearing them. And if I can recall my first meeting of you, I’d be happy to share what I thought of you.