This Was a First for Me!

If you know me very well . . . which most of you who read this do, I am almost never late for one thing . . . school, and never when there is a test. But this morning I was running just a bit late. I couldn't get my hair to work right this morning, so I spent a few more minutes on it than usual. Then I had to take Dan to work because the truck is in the shop. So these two things had me running just about five minutes later than usual.

No big deal. I would be to school on time. So I grabbed my shoes out of my closet, threw them on, and rushed out the door. After driving Dan to work, I glanced at the clock and knew getting to class on time was going to mean speeding (just a little) and speed-walking across campus. I zoomed into the parking lot, into a stall, jumped out of the car, and realized two things. I didn't wear socks (which isn't unusual), and one of my feet was colder than the other. I looked down at my racing feet . . . and my shoes didn't match!!!! I had one black leather loafer on and a brown leather clog!!!! There was not one thing I could do about it. I had a test that I had to get to and had exactly 5 minutes to walk 3 blocks to my class.

My eyes were tearing a bit from the cold, but then I started laughing! I had tears streaming down my face as I hurried to class in my mismatched shoes. I looked around and there weren't many people walking to class. They were already in class. I thought, "no one will notice." I called Tessa knowing that she was between classes too, and told her of my silly situation. She thought it was very amusing. Unbeknown to me, we were walking on an intercepting path while talking. When we ran into each other, she looked at me and said, "Oh, mother!" We laughed for a few seconds together, and then had to run. As I waved good-bye to her, she laughed and said, "One shoe doesn't have a back and the other does! How did you not notice that?" There were several people around at that moment, and all I did was laugh harder.

I got into class about one minute late, and had to gather myself so that I could concentrate on my test. I was really thankful that I only had one class today in which I had to remain mismatched. My test took twenty minutes and I was out of there almost as fast as I had gotten there. I laughed on and off all morning. I hope that my testing went better than my dressing!

Kids Say the Darndest Things

I got this email today, and it made me laugh! I thought I'd post it after adding some of our Funny Family Folktale Kid Funnies.

TESSA (age 3) was sitting by the bishop's wife in sacrament meeting. She looked up at her and said, "You must be really old."
The bishop's wife smiled and replied, "Oh, I am really old."
Then Tessa looked at her and asked, "then why aren't cha dead?"

ROSS (age 5) "Mom, you need to buy a new bed."
"Why do we need a new bed?"
"For the baby," he said.
"Oh, honey, your Dad and I aren't going to have any more babies," I replied.
My husband piped in, "When you get married, you can have all the babies you want."
Ross could hardly contain his joy and said, "When I marry Hunter (little girl that he played with), I'll just cough it [the baby] out!" Cough was the word he used for vomit. Dan almost crashed the car, and I about peed my pants.

RYAN (age 11) After we had driven up Arizona's dirt "Hell Road" into the Superstition Mountains for 20 miles of narrow switch-backs, white-knuckle blind turns, and thousand foot drop-offs, we finally reached Roosevelt Dam. Ryan asked what the piece of equipment on the top of the dam was. Dan said, "it is a crane." Ryan replied, "I've seen a lot of cranes in my life, but I've never seen a dam crane!" It was just the comic relief that we needed. It was a good thing that the road had straightened out.

ROSS (age 7) While living in Mesa, Arizona, we would go to my brother, Jamey's house and the kids would jump on his trampoline. In the 110* weather, the sun had deteriorated the trampoline mat and whenever the kids would jump they would be covered in black. One day I said to Ross, "There is black all over you. I see you've been jumping on the trampoline again. " He said, "the bad guys snuck into the backyard at night and painted the trampoline black!"

Now the email

TAMMY (age 4) was with her mother when they met an elderly,
rather-wrinkled woman her Mom knew. Tammy looked at her for a
while and then asked, "Why doesn't your skin fit your face?"

SUSAN (age 4) was drinking juice when she got the hiccups. "Please don't
give me this juice again," she said. "It makes my teeth cough."

JACK (age 3) was watching his Mom breast-feeding his new baby sister.
After a while, he asked: "Mom why have you got two? Is one for hot and
one for cold milk?"

MELANIE (age 5) asked her Granny how old she was. Granny replied
she was so old she didn't remember any more. Melanie said, "If you don't
remember, you must look in the back of your panties. Mine say five to six."

STEVEN (age 3) hugged and kissed his Mom good night. "I love you so much
that, when you die, I'm going to bury you outside my bedroom window."

BRITTANY (age 4) had an earache and wanted a pain killer. She tried in
vain to take the lid off the bottle. Seeing her frustration, her Mom
explained it was a child-proof cap, and she'd have to open it for her.
Eyes wide with wonder, the little girl asked, "How does it know it's me?"

DJ (age 4) stepped onto the bathroom scale and asked, "How much do I cost?"

MARC (age 4) was engrossed in a young couple that was hugging and kissing
in a restaurant. Without taking his eyes off them, he asked his dad, "Why is he
whispering in her mouth?"

CLINTON (age 5) was in his bedroom looking worried. When his Mom asked
what was troubling him, he replied, "I don't know what'll happen with
this bed when I get married. How will my wife fit in?"

JAMES (age 4) was listening to a Bible story. His dad read, "The man
named Lot was warned to take his wife and flee out of the city, but his
wife looked back and was turned to salt." Concerned, James asked, "What
happened to the flea?"

The Sermon I think this Mom will never forget ... This particular Sunday
sermon ... "Dear Lord," the minister began, with arms extended toward
heaven and a rapturous look on his upturned face. "Without you,we are
but dust ..." He would have continued but, at that moment, my very
obedient daughter, who was listening, leaned over to me and asked
quite audibly in her shrill, little, four-year-old-girl voice, "Mom, what
is butt dust?"

Shadow, Paris, and the Elephants

Tale II in Funny Family Folktales. This is Grandma's story.

One summer our little black Pekingese, Shadow, had tangled with a skunk. No matter what I washed her with, I couldn't get the stench out. Because it was summer and the weather was nice, I just had to keep her outside.

One evening, I was watching my grandson, Paris, who was around five years old. He was very concerned about Shadow being outside and kept asking me if he could let her in. I told him no several times.

He said, "But Grandma, she is shaking. She is cold."

Sure enough, Shadow was shaking, but I knew she wasn't cold. "No, she isn't cold. She just wants in. It is warm outside," I said.

"But, Grandma, she is scared. That is why she is shaking."

"Paris, Shadow isn't scared."

"She is scared," he continued. "We need to let her in."

I, again, told him that there was nothing for Shadow to be afraid of and that she couldn't come in because she smelled too bad, but he wouldn't give up.

"Grandma, Shadow is scared of the elephants."

"What elephants? There aren't any elephants!"

"Oh, they are out there!" He said, "you just can't see them."

5 Cent Ice Cream Cones

This is the first of our Funny Family Folktales. This is Grandpa's story.

One summer in 1946, when I was 17, I ran an ice cream counter in the drug store on Main Street and First North in Logan, Utah. One warm summer day, a little girl that looked to be about 5 years old came in the store. Before she came in, I saw her talking to her mother for a minute, apparently receiving some kind of directions.

The little girl came to my counter and ordered a couple of ice cream cones and handed me a dollar bill. After her order, she said, "I want some change."

"What kind of change do you want?" I teased, thinking that the question might stump her.

To my surprise, she rolled her eyes while glancing out the front window toward her mother, and said, "Well, " with her hands on her hips, "if you're stupid, you're not suppose to work here!"

Copyright© 2008