Stew on That April 2020

There are few things that light a fire in me quite like the local community watch pages. Most of the time they’re fine, uneventful, informative even. But, if you can dig past the lost dogs posts (be responsible pet owners, by the way, spay/neuter, fix your fence, etc.), the open houses, people asking what businesses are hiring…dig past Regina Philange posting “Dear White Tahoe that pulled out in front of me, learn how to USE THE BLINKING YELLOW LIGHTS! Sincerely, One Ticked Off Mama” and the “Best place to get your hair cut that won’t break the bank but also looks like a million bucks?” posts you’ll come across a very simple, deceiving post. “Has anyone tried the new restaurant?” It’s small, unassuming. You’d likely just scroll right past it. But once you click on the 437 comments, you see the fury of a small, yet violent, army unleashed. Dozens of citizens giving scathing reviews as if they were a New York Times food critic (“My onion rings were SLIGHTLY DARKER THAN I PREFER and the waitress had the audacity to NOT read my mind and bring me RANCH!”). People suggesting restaurants they want in town (GOLDEN CORRAL), as if restaurants just appear out of thin air. Someone (me) saying “OKAY ROBERTA if you want an Olive Garden are you going to fork over the 2 million dollars for it?” then the conversation somehow spirals into how our roads are terrible and we need more parks and then spirals again into how someone wrote curse words on the slide at the pirate park (RIP) and we can never have nice things. Ah, I love nothing more than sitting in the 6 mile long pick-up line at my child’s school, in my white Tahoe, perusing the community watch pages. And while my personal enjoyment is the most important thing to me, let’s all remember that it takes a lot of time, money, and resources to open a business and to give some freakin’ grace! Also if someone would please invest in an Olive Garden I promise I would NEVER post about you, even if you didn’t allow me to consume 43 breadsticks during the “endless breadsticks” promotion.