Category Archives: The Obvious

The things that are so obvious that it is funny.

Why Won’t the Toilet Won’t Work

Abby came in asking me, “Why won’t the Toilet won’t work?” Which of course was a double negative. Everything my mother trained me to react with (correction) was held back because the last thing I needed to do was confuse Abby with why her potty was or wasn’t flushing. The not flushing lead to me lifting the lid off the top of the commode. Wow! Abby was very impressed with the inner workings of the toilet. I can remember the same wonder of how a toilet worked. Previously it had been magic, but then it became mechanics… mechanical parts to be played with.

I hope Abby doesn’t want to not not play with the toilet [I’m so clever].

Because I’m Insensitive Like That

So today I had the privelege of leading the church service. I went through the announcements and prayer requests in the bulletin and then asked if anyone had any other prayer requests. One of the gentlemen said, “Bud [lastname withheld to protect the innocent].” Which made me ask Bud, who was sitting in another pew, what was going on. He replied, “They think I’m too skinny.”

So I said, “You’re going for the super model look, eh? You’re going to be on America’s Next Top Senior Model?”

Yes, I was on a microphone amplified throughout the building. Apparently I am missing that part of the brain that hinders my mouth from spouting out humor at the expense of the elderly.

**Oh, and for the record: Bud has a good sense of humor and thought it was funny.**

This Could Happen to You

After having the same pair of sunglasses for 4-5 years I finally misplaced them.  They could even still be in my possession, I just don’t know it.  So yesterday I went to the Southlands mall and purchased a new pair.  In the process I shopped a few stores.  Upon going into the ‘Sun Glass Hut’ which sounds like a good place to get sunglasses, I was greeted by a young man who was eager to help me get some sunglasses.  Or so I thought.  Here’s the exchange that took place:

SGH: “Can I help you find a particular pair of sun glasses?”

Me: “Yes, I’m looking for a pair of glasses between $65-$75 with glass lenses.”

SGH: “That may be hard to find here.  Have you looked at these…” [shows me some glasses that are $120.]

SGH: “These are $120.” [picks up another pair and repeats the same mantra: $120.]

Me: “What can you show me that is in the $65-$75 range with plastic lenses?”

SGH: “We don’t have anything like that either.”

Me: “You could have told me that before when I asked you about the glass lenses.”

SGH: “Yeah, I guess I could have.”

Doh!  Morons.  Customer service is sometimes losing a sale by being honest but gaining sales over the long term through honesty or helping people get what they want.

Crying Myself in Circles

This morning we went to the zoo to have some family time and to get out of the house.  At the zoo there is a carousel.  Upon installing Abby upon a black panther (the feline mammal and not the ethnically oriented militant, political group as you might have suspected) I noticed how big she was getting.  She’s not my little baby girl any more, she’s turning into a girl, soon to be followed by teenage girl and so forth.  I said to Abby, “You sure are getting big.”

Abby replied, “I sure am going to miss you when I get married, dad.”  I began holding back as many tears as I could in the manliest fashion possible.

Dishwasher Installation Tip

If you’re going to install a dishwasher by yourself without the aid of a plumber: make sure you know what your doing.  Or, alternatively you could do what the guy who lived in our house did and install it yourself and hope everything works.  Its been two years that we’ve been in this house and I’m not thrilled to report that our dishwasher stopped draining correctly, in part because the guy installed it without taking into account that the hoses and tubes, when installed incorrectly, are guaranteed to siphon dirty water back into the dishwasher at some point in time because gravity and physics have a tendency to be constant.

Stupid laws of science. 😉

Dear Teachers

Dear Teachers Around the Globe,

Please stop having sex with your students.  Seriously.  I’m tired of reading the headlines only to discover that this week no less than [editor: insert the exact number here] teachers had sexual/lewd/non-educational extra-carricular  activity with students. There is no gain in these women having an adulterous affair (at least those whom are married), the students engaging in sexual relations with people often significantly older than them, and for goodness sakes: those students will be ostrich-sized at school [SIC]!

I don’t know what holes are in your moral fabric, but if you find that your moral fabric was purchased at Victoria’s Secret and you’re having a hard time keeping your body a secret from the students… get a job at the IRS, you’ll be much less tempted there and you’ll be further away from students!

That is all.

Lions and Tigers and Hairs

Yesterday we were instructed by a specialist to get rid of our couch & matching chair downstairs and to get our heating ducts cleaned out as well as get our carpets shampooed due to Jessica having a severe allergy to… pet dander!  Yippee!  The good news is that we now know some of what has been sucking the energy out of her day-to-day life for several years now.  The bad news is that we had to go look at couches last night.  At a furniture store.  With three hundred variations on the same theme: big, wide, huge couches.  Our basement, where the problem area is, has a narrow, skinny, awkward stairway down into it which makes getting any furniture up or down it difficult.

We finally picked one set which was twice as much as I had wanted to spend but significantly better than anything else and would actually fit down our stairway.  I helped pick the house, so I get to live with narrow stairways.  I’m excited we’ll be ordering them today because it will be good to help resolve Jessica’s issues.  I’m just hoping that my family will understand if we show up at their houses with dust masks on 😉

Tell me if we shouldn’t have seen this coming:

1) Move into a house that the previous owners had dogs into while Jessica’s preggers and she’s low on energy, but we think she’s pregnant

2) Jessica’s mom moves in with us for many months with her dog – we think Jessica just had a baby so why shouldn’t she still be tired all of the time

3) We get a dog after Jessica’s mom leaves with her dog – and say, “Hey, the puppy keeps us up at night so why shouldn’t she be tired.”

4) We get rid of the puppy because Jessica is allergic to the puppy

Why we didn’t think, “Puppy-ness is still all around us – lets replace furniture and spend gobs of money to totally cleanse our environment?”

I Wish I Had A Better Memory

Do you ever have those conversations that just kill you with laughter? Each exchange of the conversation builds up to an even funnier ‘bit’? Me, too. Except that I can never remember then when I’m sitting in front of my computer. Its like my brain shuts off. I could walk away from this keyboard, have an exchange with Jessica, laugh, laugh, and laugh some more, come back here and my mind would be blank. It would be like I never talked to Jessica except for having a vague recollection of laughing with her.

I would say, “If I had a nickel for every time I had a funny conversation…,” except that a nickel isn’t worth as much any more, and you’d just feel worse that I have the memory of a flea.