On Friday, January 6th, at about 10am, I ventured out to Starbucks to get a grande nonfat mild coffee misto with sugar-free peppermint.

The last time I had been out of the house it was December. And 2011.

Yes, that’s right.

I spent an entire week at home in my bed. Pro tip: I highly recommend never getting an inner ear infection. The good news is that I’m feeling at about 85% and I find relief in exactly two things. Tylenol Sinus (I have absolutely no idea why this works, but it does) and using the Starbucks app. I swear to you, *I* am the reason companies make apps like that.

“WHAT? I can PAY for my coffee FROM MY PHONE? I don’t need to bring any money at all? None? All I have to do is register my cards online and bring in my phone? WAIT! And now you are telling me that all of my flavor shots are FREE? And I can work up to rewards? Sign me up please! I will drink Starbucks exclusively…even though I rarely drank it before because I found it slightly underwhelming and overpriced but now? Well, you are basically giving me my coffee for free, so how can I not buy my coffee at Starbucks?”

It’s genius, I tell you.

They have convinced me that I am getting some sort of great deal. Even though I’m getting, like, thirty cents off of an already-too-expensive drink. And yet, here I am, showing up for my daily $2.76 peppermint misto. As if they are giving it away. It must be what people were like when credit cards were first introduced. “WHAT? I can pay for things WITH THIS CARD?  I don’t need to bring any money at all?” It’s a slippery slope, you guys. I’m sure I won’t be the first person to go broke, one misto at a time. And if it happens, well, I can really just blame it on the ear infection. What do you mean? I’m from the past! I don’t know what things are like in 2012!

Speaking of time travel (Related: this might be my most favorite segue I have ever used on this site. Speaking of time travel. Awesome. It’s like I’m Dr. Brown right now.) I plowed through 11/22/63 this weekend. After I made the resolution to read 62 books in 2012 (which is one more book than I read in 2011, for those of you wondering why I decided on such a seemingly random number here), I realized that choosing a big, honking 849-page novel may have been a poor choice in reading material. But, you guys, I could not put this one down. I am generally a fan of Stephen King. Or I was, back when he was writing terrific character novels, but then something weird happened to him, an accident maybe (?) and he was churning out some piss-poor excuses. But now? Redeemed. REDEEMED. This one was so good. It’s like The History Channel meets Back To The Future meets Friday Night Lights meets Pleasantville.

(And if you know anything about me, you know that this is something I’d be willing to get behind. Probably twice.)

I know the entire planet seems to be reading The Hunger Games right now, but I am telling you, this is so much better. And this one wasn’t even written for 5th graders! (Note: I have absolutely nothing against The Hunger Games. In fact, I read it and liked it in 2009 when I was choosing a read-aloud book at work. For grade 7. Heh).

And I have no fancy segue for this, but I just wanted to ask your thoughts on the all-caps. You know, when I tweet something like:

You see, when I first started tweeting, I found the interface to be somewhat limiting. I mean, I was okay with the 140-character limit, but the lack of bold and italics were making me twitchy. As you know, bloggers tend to be, um, what’s the word…EMOTIONAL. And because of this obvious character flaw, I feel the need to express myself through bold and italics and words spelled out in all-caps. I have also become a fan of doing *this* to express to you that I am putting MAJOR EMPHASIS on that this. Now, I am sort of put-off by tweets that are written like this: I REALLY LOVE PAPERCLIPS! IS THERE ANYTHING BETTER ON THIS PLANET?! Because, well, really? Is there anything worth that much emotion? Possibly an encounter with Jon Hamm. Possibly.

There seem to be two camps, as far as capital letters go. The ones who see it as emphasis and the ones who see it as screaming.

Obviously, I’m in the emphatic camp.

What camp are you in?