True. Sometimes, there is just no way to avoid it. What gets me is when someone I can barely recall ever having met approaches in that wide-eyed sing-song manner & says, 'How AAARRREEE you?' Ummm...don't you mean 'WHO ARE YOU'?
Today, when I was walking my pug ( I skulk out before all the suburbanites come ricocheting back from work in the city to minimize the odds of this happening) some woman & her young adult daughter were right where the path emerges from the woods, walking their dog. The woman came right up to me grinning from ear to ear: "HOW AAAARRREEEE YOU?!? Long time no see!!!' (Who the H*LL IS THIS?!?) She was eye-balling me & she had these humongous round sunken yet bugged out brown eyes: the kind where you can see the white sclera all around the iris; like Cookie Monster on Sesame Street (YIKES!).
Before I could mutter the wrong thing, she began gushing about how our dogs were getting on (she has a 9yr old Bichon Frisé). Then, she asked a few dog questions I could passably answer. I even asked her about her dog. Turns out, she remembers me from high school (!!!). She went on about how I hadn't changed at all (I graduated in '82). Her dog began pulling at the leash, so off she went, waving happily. I still have no idea who she is!