She gave new meaning to the word "safety"

And unfortunately, that meaning was "not safe".

I was at a shopping center today with my boys when I was accosted in the parking lot by a woman there advocating child safety. Or, more specifically, trying to sell child ID cards for ridiculous sums of money. Okay, in and of itself, that's fine. I'm all in favor of my kids being safe, even if it costs ridiculous sums of money.

But here was the thing: she had her table set up in the emergency vehicle lane of a busy parking lot. Not on the nearby sidewalk, but right out in the parking lot. Okay, I guess in the event of an emergency, she could drag her table out of the way pretty quickly, strewing D.A.R.E. swag as she ran, but it just seemed an odd choice. Especially because, as I've already mentioned, IT'S A BUSY PARKING LOT! She was talking to me. Did she really think I was paying attention? Heck no. I was too busy trying to make sure that my three year olds didn't run out into traffic.

You know, basic children's safety. Like she wanted me to pay for. I think, instead, I'll just avoid crazy people who have set up children's safety tables in the middle of busy parking lots. That's my efforts to keep my kids safe today.

Random unrelated thought: It's been a while since I've talked about books, which is odd because I've been reading a lot of good ones recently. But one I have to mention is John Adams by David McCullough. I've had this book sitting in my to-read pile for quite some time. I'd heard it was good, but 1) it's approximately two thousand pages long (okay, fine, 768 pages but that's still pretty dense, heavy reading for summer!), and 2) it's about John Adams. Not exactly my preferred subject matter. But the book was so engaging and really interesting. Highly recommended, and not just to American History buffs, since I am, by no stretch of the imagination, especially buffy about American History.

Now I'm reading Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum, our book group selection this month. It's a fiction novel set during the Holocaust, and while I'm not far into it at the moment, it grabbed me from nearly the first page.

What are you reading? Anything good?