1. Do you know how long it’s been since I used hunt-and-peck typing??

2.  FOR-E-VER, that’s how long.

3.  I began keyboarding in my teens so that’s a long dang time. After that many years you build up speed and that’s how I zoom through stuff.

4.  You know what prevents all the zooming? Burning four fingers on my right hand, that’s what.

5.  I may be the queen of kitchen mishaps. I don’t really know if I’m distracted or what but stuff just seems to go sideways in there.

6.  There’s a reason I keep bandaids and Neosporin in a kitchen drawer because damn.

7.  Anyhoo, I decided to tackle re-seasoning my cast iron skillet since the oven’s finally fixed. [Can I get an Amen?!]

8.  It had looked scruffy for several weeks but I just kept oiling it with a wing and a prayer, hoping it wouldn’t die before I could do a serious fix.

9.  So yesterday I set a tin foil lined cookie sheet on the bottom shelf before preheating the oven.

10.  Meanwhile I scrubbed the cast iron pan, rubbed a fresh layer of coconut oil all over it, and placed it upside down on the oven’s top shelf.

11.  That’s when my brain fritzed.

12.  The cast iron wasn’t hot so I wasn’t using a glove. I slid the pan further back on the rack then realized the tin foil was in the wrong place now…and what did my dummy hand do?

13.  It reached right out to push the cookie sheet further back. The THREE HUNDRED FIFTY DEGREE cookie sheet. Not good.

14.  Cue googling severe burns while sticking my hand under cool running water.

15.  By the end of the day things were…well, they were better but they weren’t great. I’ve got small blistering on two fingers and a giant blister on my pinky finger plus burn pinpoints up all four.

16.  Do I have any idea how I did that? No, not really.

17.  But I bet you’re not wondering anymore why I keep a stash of first aid supplies nearby.

18.  Which all leads up to me typing a 40 things post with four fingers on my left hand and two on my right.

19.  Looking hugely ridiculous, I might add.

20.  Not that Mia minds. She’s perched behind my head looking untroubled, as always.

21.  Bear had a crazy schedule recently so I took a zoom meeting for her about NIL.

22.  What’s that, you ask? Well, the NCAA recently passed name, image, and likeness (“NIL”) so nonprofessional athletes can earn revenue after they’ve graduated from high school.

23.  I have to be honest, saying I’d listen in was kind of a throwaway offer but the meeting turned out to be really interesting.

24.  Like the fact that ESPN estimates non-revenue athletes (which, best as I can tell, is primarily anyone who plays anything other than Men’s Football and Men’s Basketball) will earn $1k-$3k a year.

25.  Other ESPN estimates: revenue athletes will earn $5k-$20k a year, All-American athletes will earn $500k-$1M a year, and Olympic athletes will earn $15k-$75k a year.

26.  THAT IS REAL MONEY, PEOPLE.

27.  And I love it. Those student athletes work h-a-r-d for their sports and there’s no reasons they shouldn’t earn something if they can work out the branding.

28.  Would I have wanted to do it? Not really, but then again I don’t think I was made to be a collegiate athlete. They had a challenging schedule, to say the least.

29.  I’m a bit behind the ball in twitter land.

30.  That doesn’t make sense, I know, but there’s this whole social contract over there that says if someone follows you…

31.  Some people finish that with “then you have to follow back.” I go with the “vet and follow back” code because it sits better with me.

32.  It’s a big world out there and frankly, it’s okay to admit not all of it’s for me.

33.  There was one guy who followed me recently after another account boosted (think: advertised) me, but when I vetted his account every post was him without a shirt.

34.  Him at a mountain overlook, shirtless. Him after a bike ride, shirtless. Him in his backyard for some reason or another, shirtless. Did he have great abs? Sure. Did I feel a need to follow his account? Nope, but big props for the work, man.

35.  Twitter messages (aka DMs) are another weird area. I’d always wonder why some people felt the need to write in their bio “NO DMs!!!” It just didn’t seem that deep; you don’t want messages then don’t check the dumb messages. Done.

36.  Then I started seeing some of the weird stuff that comes in. Like this: “Hi dear thanks for the friendship i like you i am not typing well here please contact me through my email i will tell you where i am and everything about me: [redacted]@gmail.com”. So many red flags.

37.  Plus the one where the guy asked if I was looking for a sugar daddy. Ummm…nope.

38.  Some is random spam but I deal with so much of that in my email it doesn’t even faze me to scroll on by.

39.  I’ve seen more than a few bios boast this gem: “You send me porn, I BLOCK YOU” which I would have thought was a given.

40.  Then again, who am I to say? Maybe my unsolicited porn is another person’s surprise in the (virtual) mail. Po-tay-toe, po-tah-toe. Happy Friday!