def not_a_string(obj):
    """It's probably not a string, in the sense
    that Python2/3 get confused about these things"""
    my_type = str(type(obj))
    if is_py3():
        is_str = my_type.find('bytes') < 0 and my_type.find('str') < 0
        return is_str

    return my_type.find('str') < 0 and \
        my_type.find('unicode') < 0