Hi, I'm Anne Strange Champs. When I walked into my local coffee shop the other day, a guy on the other side of the room stood up and smiled and waved at me.

And so I smiled and waved back, and then I realized he wasn't even looking at me. He was waving at the woman behind me.

Awkward.

This kind of thing happens to me all the time.

Probably to you too.

I think a stranger asked me a question,

and I'm partway through the answer

when I realize she was talking on the phone.

I passed someone on the street,

and just as I meet, I trip over my own feet.

This kind of stuff can make you want to crawl into a hole.

Instead, today, onto the best of our knowledge, we're going to share the shame. Let's talk about awkwardness.

Beginning with the most awkward, embarrassing time of all the teenage years.

Hello, Leslie. How is your day today? awkward, embarrassing time of all the teenage years.

Hello, Leslie. How is your day today?

Mine's quite well, I must admit. I do hope that yours is a good one, because what you are about to read may or may not add an extra color to the rainbow at day's end.

A couple of years ago, Dave Nadelberg was rummaging through his parents' attic

when he discovered this, an old letter that he wrote as a teenager, a letter to a girl he had

a crush on, a girl who probably didn't even know his name.

The older we all get, and the more the time that we include into history passes on,

it has seemingly become harder and harder to get to know one other. So to keep up with the

difficulties of modern times, I have devised four ways of introducing myself in the best possible

...