Guess what I had for dinner tonight. If you guessed sushi, give yourself a gold star.

I was talking to my mom tonight and she started telling me a story about when I was little, about five maybe, and her mother and my father's parents were all over at our house. I had gone to take a bath and my "Ma" (my fraternal grandmother) had gone in to check on me. Well, she had just rejoined the others when I came out of the bathroom, dripping wet and said, "Mama, Ma just said she loved me more than Grandmother [meaning my mom's mother]! Why did she say that?!" Needless to say things got a bit awkward after that and my mom, not knowing what to tell me, said, "Oh honey, Ma was just teasing you." That seem to satisfy me and I went back to the bathroom, promptly forgetting the whole thing. Of course it was a lie, my grandmother meant exactly what she said and my other grandmother never forgave her for it, but that's all really beside the point of why my mother was bringing up this story now.

She told me that she realized now (from the look on my face and the tone of my voice) that even at that age I knew that what my grandmother had said was wrong, that it was an injustice. And I was going to take care of it right then...or to quote her, "you stomped in there and held court; I mean how many five year olds do that to a group of adults?"

She also reminded me of another time, in high school, when our band director started verbally laying into a group of students in front of a gathering of the whole band and all of their parents. I stood up, in front of everybody, and told him in detail why he was wrong. I also told him how unfair it was for a man with a doctorate and a position of power to humiliate a group of high school students in front of their parents. It shocked the hell out of everyone because I was a shy, quiet and overly serious kid - not the type of student who would ever defy an authority figure or talk much above a whisper.

'Course, I remember that one and I remember parents coming up to me afterwards telling me how impressed they were. And I remember thinking, "What's the big deal? He was wrong and he ticked me off."

So what's point of all this? "Well," my mom said, "I was just thinking about your blog and how you get when you see an injustice. You get indignant and head off to fix it right then, just like you did when you were five and like you did in high school. I guess I've just never realized that you've always been this way. So I guess it makes sense that you should start a blog."

You heard it hear first folks: I was born to blog.

I know this will probably sound like false modesty, but the whole thing mystifies me a bit. My mom seems to see this as some wonderful heroic quality in me and she's very proud of it (and me). I find it to be more of an annoyance than anything; I can guarantee you that if I could just learn to keep my mouth shut instead of stomping into situations (like the one on MSN) full of fire and righteous indignation, demanding justice - if I could just shut up, my life would be much more tranquil and I'd probably a happier person in the long run. Because, quite frankly, not everybody loves a crusader and sooner or later someone's going to nail me, either verbally or physically, for pulling this crap. Sooner or later there will be consequences - it's a miracle it hasn't happened before now.

Of course it's no use knowing this - I'm not going to change. I wouldn't know how, quite frankly. It's not like I plan these things. Stuff just happens and the next thing I know I'm hip deep in it without remembering making the choice to wade in. So I guess I'll have to grin and bear it and hope that my luck holds.

---

I'll try to work on the Tour tonight, but I can't promise you much at this point. I haven't felt up to doing much blog walking this week. But I'll give it a go and we'll see what happens.

Thank you to everyone who wrote in to my other blog comments to tell me about good things. It means a great deal to me and I promise I'll get to answering you each individually later. And keep them coming if you've got 'em - I have a feeling we could all use as many warm fuzzies as we can get.

Oh, and I am feeling much better tonight (almost forgot to mention THAT).