That time I was accused of shoplifting

Never lie, steal, cheat, or drink. But if you must lie, lie in the arms of the one you love. If you must steal, steal away from bad company. Blah blah blah…

Hitch

For the record, Hitch (Will Smith) did NOT say “blah, blah, blah” but the point of that quote is he talked about stealing and I have NOT stolen anything from a store. Never ever ever. Ever never never. But…

One time a store employee followed me out and discretely asked me to give back what I took.

I responded with a weak declaration of innocence. I know why he assumed I took something– when I leave a store without buying anything, I assume they think I stole something because who leaves without buying something? Well, I’m sure lots of people do but every time I leave empty-handed I look and feel guilty, even though I’m never guilty! Gosh, I would soooo fail any lie detector test even if I was not lying.

It’s the weirdest, and most annoying, feeling that still happens to this very day.

I don’t know exactly how to get past the discomfort I feel when I leave without spending money at any particular place of business. But folks, this might be a shocker, but there are times I go in to a store and don’t find anything I went there for. Come to think about it, I feel this same uneasiness when I go to an estate sale but don’t buy something. The estate sale thing isn’t a feeling of guilt, exactly… more of a feeling that I owe them something since they did all this work to label everything and I’m audacious enough to not, at least, spend a few dollars.

I’m just socially awkward. That’s all it is. There is circumstance after circumstance where I don’t want to talk or have anyone’s attention and that’s just how it is! Of course, there are also moments I thrive around people, but that’s more rare. I suppose in concert with that is the need to appear likable. To come off as a decent person… caring what people think. In the suspicious shoplifting situations, I worry about looking guilty which probably makes me act differently, making me look guilty.

Do you have any advice or tricks that can make me look less guilty, and feel more comfortable around people at all times? Something that can help me leave a store where I didn’t spend money without having shame? Share in the comments below! Also, go watch Hitch if you haven’t yet. It’s a great movie.

Thanks for stopping by!

-Out of the Wilderness

Music from Big Sky (Season 1 ep.10-11) on ABC Spring 2021

** NOTE: Music from season 2 episode 1 can be found here on 10/01/2021 **

Say what you want about Big Sky, one thing is for sure… whoever is picking the music they license is 100% nailing it. Even going back to the early episodes of season 1 (click here for music from those episodes), they are doing a lot of work to find music that fits perfectly into the particular scenes.

EPISODE 10- Catastrophic Thinking

“Dear Mr. Fantasy” Traffic…

“Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man” Conway Twitty & Loretta Lynn…

“Bad Moon Rising” Minotaur Jr. (singer: Alaska Reid)…

EPISODE 11- All Kinds of Snakes

“Me and Mine” The Brothers Bright…

Thanks for stopping by!

-Out of the Wilderness

Facebook DeafHoops Group ad… the music and more!

Facebook has an ad out now pushing their Groups platform, a place where people of common interests can “meet” and share all the things. This new ad uses a group of deaf basketball players, take a look…

The DeafHoops Facebook Group is private and has over two thousand members. If you’d like to join, click here to be taken to their front page. Once there, click “join group” and wait for approval.

The song cleverly used is “Oh So Quiet” by Betty Hutton, which was released 70 years ago, yep, all the way back in 1951. Here is the full track, then scroll down for more info!

A cover was also made popular for the 90s generation by Bjork. Although, to be honest, I was listening to MCHammer, Vanilla Ice, and Kris Kross. Anyway, here is Bjork’s version…

Betty Hutton’s version was also used in this Acura TLX commercial in 2020:

Wikipedia points out this song is a cover of a Horst Winter song called “Und jetzt ist es still,” which you can hear below.

An insightful article was written in BBC News about how Facebook has helped the deaf community by providing video messages, dating back to 2016. Check it out here.

Thanks for stopping by!

-Out of the Wilderness

Bird book. A book of birds. From 1983.

It’s so weird that when you become interested in something, you see that thing everywhere you go. Know what I mean? Like, when you like a certain kind of car, you see that exact car all over town. It’s strange. It happened to me recently with birds, of all things.

When I was in Florida visiting family I became obsessed with photographing birds, whether it was bald eagles…

pelicans…

Or any other bird…

some kind of flycatcher? can’t identify this one yet…

Back in Nashville, a week or two after returning from Florida, I went to an estate sale and as some of you might know, the wide and crazy array of things you can find at an estate sale is a real thing, and at this one I found a book.

Also, it was only a dollar! That’s $6.95 less than it was in 1983! Well, with inflation, maybe the value is about the same but whatever, I can think of lots of other things I wasted more money on.

This book has already been an asset, helping me identify birds like this one. I am slowly reading through the book and it’s really fascinating how old this makes me sound. But I’m also old enough to not care how reading a book about birds makes me sound old. I had no idea being 42 came with such freedom!

If you have a bird question, send it my way. As long as the bird you’re curious about existed in 1983 or earlier, I can look it up…

Thanks for perching on my blog for a little while!

-Out of the Wilderness

That time I saw a snake

A few days ago I did an internet search for a snake as I was researching this Jeep commercial. Now, I don’t know if the internets are this advanced but not more than a day later I was walking at the dog park and saw this:

I’ve heard stories of Alexa and other smart tech listening in on conversations and ads popping up on Facebook of things you’ve Googled, but this is a whole new level! Search for a snake online, find a snake in the woods. Creepy!

The snake slithered right across the path and then, of course, one of my dogs walked inches away from the snake even though I forbid her from doing that. Thankfully, it was just a harmless garter snake that didn’t bite. I watched in awe as it climbed a up this bush and up to the top where it rested overlooking those who may pass by.

I ran back to my car to get this Sony A6600 camera for better pictures but when I returned, the snake was long gone. Well, I say “long gone” when it actually could’ve just been inches away from my face, but I didn’t find it to get those better pictures.

Glad it wasn’t a poisonous snake, that’s #1. And #2, funny how things you’re interested in are what you wind up seeing. Like when you’re looking to buy a particular brand and model of car and then you see them everywhere around town.

Weird stuff. Anyway, thanks for stopping by! I’ll leave you with a short video of our new friend.

-Out of the Wilderness