No Ma'am.

A fellow blogger, Lindsay, a gifted photographer with a wicked sense of humor, has started a new feature on her blog called "No. Ma'am". It's a discussion of those instances in which our fellow citizens so blatantly violate the general standards of reason and good conduct that we are forced to utter a genteelly drawled "No Ma'am" as the only possible comment on their misbehavior.
As I am a frustrated witness to such events on a daily basis, I think it will prove a fertile ground.

For instance: When I am shopping in a drugstore and am an unwilling audience to to EVERY DETAIL of a fellow shopper's in-depth cell phone conversation about the child custody dispute in which she and her soon-to-be-ex-husband are currently embroiled, complete with mutual restraining orders and allegations of theft and battery. NO MA'AM.

When the nose-ringed sacker at HEB, having plumped a five-pound bag of potatoes on top of a bag of Sun Chips, abandons the last two-thirds of my grocery order in order to read and reply to a text massage. NO MA'AM.

And my current favorite: When a single woman with no job, no income, and six children under the age of eight, currently living with her mother and receiving government assistance, has herself implanted with EIGHT EMBRYOS, keeps them all, and delivers octuplets who will immediately cost the State of California about $3 million in medical bills and who will likely be living on government assistance for their entire childhoods.
All together now: NO. MA'AM.