Category: Family

Posting for yesterday here.  I was sitting in the kitchen, eating chili while reading some work papers, when David appeared in front of me.  “Where does this go?” he asked, thrusting a Miraculous Medal toward my face.

“Just a minute,” I said, trying to finish my paragraph.  Whereupon the Medal flew from David’s fingers, slid down my papers, and landed in my chili.  “OK, you didn’t have to do that,” I added, “just because I asked you to wait.”

Whereupon David shriveled up like a raisin.

Posting for yesterday here.  It’s a challenge, because the one thing that had us laughing again and again was not a funny gag or zingy one-liner but a slow, ongoing natural event.

The weather station was still predicting no precipitation when the snow began early in the afternoon–huge flakes plummeting in piles.  By evening, when five or six inches lay on the lawn, the weather station was conceding the possibility of a two- or three-inch snowfall.  The kids were beginning to offer opinions about what the Boss ought to say to whomever was on duty at the weather station.

I have sympathy for these people, but I think maybe they need to install better technology at the station.  Maybe a window, for example.

So today was not a funny day.  I spent my entire day in meetings, dealing with people’s distress and failings, while on the home front the kids were worn out and cranky after a way-too-fun Sunday.  (We spent a whole day at the Mortensens’–worked on a robot, poured gasoline on a Christmas tree and lit ‘er up–the whole package.)

At the end of the day, neither Jacinta nor I could remember a single funny thing from the day.  Not a single giggle.  So I called in David and Isaiah, explained about the blog, and told them, “OK: do something funny!”

David about died of self-consciousness.  He grinned awkwardly, fumbled his fingers, and chewed on his alarm clock.  Isaiah punched him in the ribs.  They both squirmed and giggled.

And you know what?  IT WAS FUNNY!

On January 15 of this year, the 1st Financial Bank USA sent me this letter:

Dear Jeremy R Holmes:

We recently discovered that the amount of the Cashback Reward that has been credited to your 1st Financial Bank USA credit card account is less than it should have been in accordance with your Cashback Reward Terms and Conditions.  We apologize for this error, but are pleased to report that it has been corrected and that your account has been credited the full Cashback Reward to which you are entitled.

Sincerely,

YOUR CUSTOMER SERVICE REPRESENTATIVES

Now that’s what I like to see from a bank.  I want Cashback and Rewards–note the capital letters highlighting the importance of each word.  I’ll bet they apologize.  The nerve, holding back on the loot, the booty, the inheritance to which I am entitled!  “Entitled”–that’s a good word, too.  Lucky you, 1st Financial Bank, ’cause I was about to sue until you apologized.  Don’t try it again–I might not be so patient next time!

Since we were gone all day yesterday, I hadn’t sorted through the mail until this morning.  There it was:  a check from 1st Financial Bank USA for $0.13.  They spent more on postage for that check than the check itself was worth.

Good thing I hadn’t booked my tickets to Hawaii yet.

Yesterday we went to Casper to look at flooring, and we did not get back until very late.  So I’m posting now for yesterday’s FTT.

It was a great trip.  We had lunch at the Fire Rock Cafe–the food excellent, the service obsequious.  While waiting for our food, I suddenly thought to myself that I need to stay alert for the FTT–who knows what might happen on a trip!  And at that exact moment, Jacinta commented, “You need to be on the watch for the FTT–you never know what will happen.”

Eerie.  How does she do that?

A clue came later in the evening as we dined with friends.  Our friends had invited over some other friends, a deacon and his wife, and the conversation turned to why people in Wal-Mart look so strange.  The deacon’s wife, Ruthie, had a complete account of the Wal-Mart people, and it begins with sweaty shirts:  some scientists did this study, see, in which they had a bunch of men work out and get sweaty, and then they took the sweaty shirts and had a bunch of women smell them.  Normal women, explained Ruthie, could smell the phonemes in the shirt.

At this point, confused about how these otherwise normal women could smell the smallest contrastive unit in the sound system of a language, I suggested that Ruthie meant “pheromones.”  Ruthie admitted that this was probably the right word, and went on to explain how women who were using contraception couldn’t smell the phonemes at all.  This meant that their choice of men was completely thrown off, because they went for men with the wrong phonemes for their genetic make-up.

I don’t know exactly how that gets us to the Wal-Mart people, that secretive bunch that never comes out in daylight in Wyoming except in Wal-Mart and at the tattoo shop, but it did set me to thinking about Jacinta’s ability to read my mind.  What if I signal my thoughts by way of masculine pheromones?  What if, having been married to me for so long, Jacinta can actually smell what I’m thinking before I let off a single phoneme?  It’s an intriguing possibility.

I wonder if it works better when I’m sweaty.

We’re only twenty four posts into this project, and already I have discovered a major flaw in my premise:  most of my day, most days of the week, is spent at work, which means that most of the funny things that happen to me are either confidential or too embarrassing to someone for me to publish.  So much of what I blog has to with children, who know nothing of confidentiality–they announce loudly each trip to the bathroom–and won’t know whether I’m blogging about them anyway.

But I can’t keep this up.  I simply must find a way to write about the rest of my day.  So here is technique #1:  Make it anonymous.  As long as the person about whom I write would not be annoyed to know I found his or her foible funny, then I can change the names and blog with impunity.  (Technique #1.5:  Never mention this blog to anyone at work.)

So from today:

An administrator within my place of employ wrote a follow-up e-mail to a very promising potential employee:  “We are still quite untested in your visiting.”

A colleague who received a BCC on this e-mail pointed out the mistake, so the aforementioned administrator sent a revised e-mail:  “Sorry about the typo.  I meant to write that we are still quite intersted in your visiting.”

I imagine the promising potential employee found the whole thing quite intersting, but is probably himself still untested about visiting an institute of higher leaning with such an intestine grasp of spilling.

Now I know that Tina the three-year-old is rapidly emerging as the star of the Funny Thing of Today.  Usually, if several funny things happen in one day then I try to blog about the non-Tina story.  But today’s Tina incident tickled me so much that I would have to rank it number 1 regardless.  The following conversation took place on the way to Bernadette’s “Little Women” club:

Tina:  Where are we going?

Jacinta:  Oh, we’re just going to drop Bernadette off.

Tina [after a thoughtful pause]:  I don’t want to be dropped off.  I don’t like being dropped off.

Jacinta:  We’re not going to drop you off, just Bernadette.

Tina:  I don’t want to be dropped off.  I don’t like being dropped off.  [Pause to process.]  Bernadette, why are you being dropped off?

Bernadette:  Oh, it’s OK, Tina, big girls like being dropped off.

Tina [pause, process, conclude]:  I’m too tiny to be dropped off!

As I left home today to chair a meeting of all the teachers at WCC, my head hurt viciously.  In fact, I was seriously worried about whether I could focus or even remain coherent over the next two hours.

My solution came when I saw our fantastic Latin teacher, Patrick Owens, sitting at the table.  I explained to the faculty about my head and then told them my game plan:  “If I lapse into incoherent babble, we’re all going to pretend that it’s Latin, and Patrick will ‘translate’ to keep up appearances.”

Everyone seemed agreeable and the meeting went on.  However, I did not lapse into incoherency–so far as I know, that is!

Yesterday I didn’t feel well in the evening at the time when I typically blog, so I’m behind a day on my Funny Thing of the Day.  I’ll try to come up with two on a single day at some point soon so I can catch up to my quota.  Meanwhile, here is today’s FTT, a mini-drama in one act:

***

[Late evening, well after kids’ bedtime.  Mother running on the treadmill.  Enter toddler in underpants, shirt and pants in hand.]

Toddler:  I’m getting dressed for the day!  I am putting on day clothes.

Mother:  (pant, gasp) It’s not daytime. (pant, gasp) You should be in bed!

Toddler:  I’m going to go to bed in my day clothes.  I changed out of my wet pants so you wouldn’t see them on me.

Mother [Almost falls off treadmill–not good to laugh while running!]:  GO TO BED!

By Advent of last year, Bernadette had reached that point of piano proficiency at which playing becomes pleasurable.  I handed her My First Book of Christmas Carols and told her, “This is your piano lesson book for the Advent and Christmas seasons.”  She played both dutifully and joyfully, and sang along.  Which was great, because she and others of our kids have trouble carrying a tune, but with all the singing practice over Advent they could actually sing Christmas songs by the time Christmas rolled around.

Everyone down through Tina sings Christmas songs now.  Their favorite was “Deck the Halls.”  I got a giggle today when I heard Regina’s rendering of “See the blazing Yule before us!”

Her version:  “See the blazing Yuletide forest!”  Brings up a rather fantastic image.