My woman's intuition told me that my self-deleted blog was upsetting to some people. 

So here's what I'm going to say. Where is my freedom of expression? I know you have your freedom of the press, but I have my right of freedom of speech. My opinions are my opinions, and I passed down the concerns of my hometown's residents through my blog. Yet, when I posted my blog, another blog got posted. A blog I expected to get posted.

Talk about listening to the general public's comments and concerns. Next time I won't make it so evident. To keep myself from being "liable" for my words, I deleted my blog. Thank you for taking away the freedom that I thought I had in telling what the public thought. 

I sure appreciate it. Remind me about this if I decide to join the military and fight for your freedom, the very one you took from me.

Now that I'm no longer at the Advocate, I must feel that I tell the general public about four of the most talented and underrated people there.

I worked for three years full-time in the Lifestyle department. That's where the Good Living, Sunday Your Life, Home&Garden, M3, Sunday Your Money&Markets and Faith sections got built. Before redesign, we also put together the Matagorda Advocate, which now is out of their hands, and one person took care of typing in all of the weddings, engagements, anniversaries, club news, etc. Now they continue to do the diversion pages and help out with other sections that I may have forgotten.

Why am I bringing this up? Well, because four ladies deserve to have their name mentioned. They are Janet Jones (Lifestyle editor and Freehand expert), Meredith Cash (senior copy editor and fastest page designer of the south), Shari Prenzler (copy editor and the most unique page designer) and Karla Woodward (community news specialist extraordinaire). I know that they don't hold these titles anymore (yeah, I exaggerated a little but I do mean what I say) but these ladies deserve much respect. I was a part of that department and couldn't ask for a better group of people to have ever worked with.

I believe in giving credit where credit is due. And theirs is long overdue. The special editions of the M3 sections (think Harry Potter and Pirates of the Caribbean) were put together by them with the assistance of the greatest creative mind out there, Ryan Huddle. Every time you pick up one of these sections, remember the names Janet, Meredith and Shari. They take pride in their work. When you need to speak to someone about events in the area, Karla has always been on top of it. I was very lucky to work with these ladies, and I'm very proud of them.

OK, if there is one thing I am a big stickler about (other than cleanliness and having ample amount of Germ X around) is customer service. Here is my question: Why is it so hard for people to give good customer service? It's not hard. All you have to do is put yourself in the customer's shoes and speak to them as how you would want to be spoken to. Service with a smile regardless of who the customer is or the attitude in which they have walking in the doors. This is especially true when they come in with a good attitude and you present yourself in a rude manner. That'll make them leave with a bad attitude.

Case in point: I went to the grocery store and bought one of those meal deals -- buy a certain item or items and you get four to five items free. When I made it up to the register, I happen to forget one of the items I had to buy for the coupons to work. The cashier (whose name shall be withheld but trust me, I did get her name and saved the receipt that has her ID) made my forgetfulness evident as she flung the coupons at me and said I have to get the second item.

After a mad dash to find this forgotten item, which coincidentally wasn't with the meal deal as the cashier announced to us, my mom and I get back up to the register. I begin to notice how she is chunking my stuff toward the back where my mom is bagging -- yeah, you read that correctly. I'm beginning to get really mad because she is tossing my groceries down that conveyer belt. BIG MISTAKE! It's bad enough that potato chips have more air than chips in their bags, but I have this little girl flinging my stuff, possibly creating nothing but crumbs. I give her my money, look at her name badge and she then bumps the register shut with a vengeance. OK. The only thing I can muster up is, "Nice customer service." (Hey, I told y'all I was sarcastic.)

My main problem with this was she gave me a vibe where I was inconveniencing her. Umm ... isn't she getting paid for me to be an "inconvenience"? Again, I work in retail. There were many days, like today, where I was constantly busy. But never would I make a customer feel like they were bothering me. Never would I rush a customer into getting what they needed just so I can move on to the next customer.

So excuse me, Miss Congeniality Cashier. Next time I spend between the hours of 7 a.m. and 3 p.m. digging for Christmas items in a trailer, putting merchandise on shelves 12 feet above the ground, putting out more Christmas stuff, restacking pallets of 20+ pound bags of deer corn, working non-stop (minus my lunch hour) in not just my department but helping for an hour in another department and clocking out for the day only to clock back in after 30 minutes to help build something outside in the heat, I will attempt to remember to get the salad that goes with my meal deal. Sorry for the inconvenience. I'll try to remember to take my pills where I don't forget as much.

Now if I can only find where I left them.

One of the many off-the-wall thoughts that plagues my mind is why products claim they are 99.9 percent free of something. How is that possible? What happened to the 0.1 percent? It makes me wonder if someone got tired on the assembly line. Then, there is fat free, which I heard nothing is fat free. Someone please enlighten me.

Speaking of, let's take fat-free milk. To my understanding and someone's comment that passed through my ears, fat-free milk isn't really fat free. Well, that's just silly. That's misrepresentation of the product I spend $2-$3 on. I hope that the person who told me that is wrong, but we wouldn't know something is fat free unless we worked in the factory in which the product came from.

I will say this: I was working one day, and I saw this Christmas ornament (yes, I know, it's time) that was covered completely in glitter -- or so I thought. I turned the ornament around and saw a bald spot. That was one of those "it's-5-o'clock" ornaments, which means it was the last item of the day where the person who worked on it got it semi-completed before they raced to the timeclock. Now that, my friends, is a 99.9 percent glitter ball.

I hope furniture companies make sure their products aren't 99.9 percent free of anything. The last thing I need is for me to roll like a butterball if my bed falls or a chair breaks. I guarantee I will be 100 percent ticked.

I know that there are bridge clubs, quilters guilds and many other clubs in which members get together to discuss their respective shared hobbies, but as the years go by, it seems like these clubs are becoming members on some sort of endangered species list.

I remember when I was a little knuckle-headed kid, my mom and the other moms on the base got together and had Tupperware parties. For all the Generation Y youngsters, think of Tupperware parties like Pampered Chef parties. If you still don't know what I'm talking about, ask someone else because I'm definitely not the person who needs to be in a kitchen. (I messed up boiled eggs one time. I forgot about the science of evaporation and pop went the eggshell.) 

Nowadays, there are so many hobbies that I haven't even heard about. I found out today that one of my friends, who I shall call "Vanilla" to protect her identity, would make a game out of seeing how many people wear a certain hairstyle when she went shopping. What?! To me, that's just boredom, but it's something that keeps her entertained. Then, there are those who consider piercings, tattoos, updating MySpace profiles and looking at videos on YouTube a hobby ... wait, those are mine. Oops. But I'm sure I'm not the only one. It's difficult for kids to go outside and play when there are video game systems calling out their inner rockstar with "Guitar Hero 3."

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy reading, writing and, yes, blogging. I wouldn't mind learning how to sew but me + sharp objects = the apocalypse. Even I got into the whole MySpace phenomenon. Of course, I'm just there to catch up with friends and classmates. (wink, wink) It makes me wonder what kind of hobbies will crop up by the time my children have children. That's a scary thought. So scary that if anyone needs me, I'll be crawled underneath that boulder on the corner of Cedar and Peabody Streets.