Mild Amusement

A little while ago, we had some family stay with us. Among other people, one of my younger cousins stayed with us for a few days. I hadn't met her before, so I was actually a bit worried how everyone would react. I mean, I can handle adults, but I'm never quite sure how to deal with teenage boys and girls. They talk differently, they have far different interests, and they tend to regard anyone who is older than them as strange. All in all, it's a dicey proposition. Still, I happen to be the youngest of the adults in the house, and I am also the youngest at heart (being a smart aleck tends to do that). So, on more than one occasion, I found myself trying to engage this cousin in conversation or otherwise keep her company. It wasn't horribly awkward or anything, but it took a little bit of time before that initial shyness passed. And, at one point, we were talking about school or something, when she mentioned handball. Now, we just so happen to have these little balls...

A few days ago, I went to a holiday party with some friends. This is actually something that we've done for several years in a row, and we always look forward to it. It's fun to see old friends and catch up, and there's always some delicious grub to be had. Mix in some alcohol and the fact that we've got a few jokers in the bunch, and we always end up having a good time. However, there is one very interesting turn of events that tends to crop up at these parties that scares me just a little bit. I always refer to it as the moonshine. You see, one of the friends has some relatives overseas. During one of the early incarnations of this party, she had just returned from a trip to visit these relatives. She figured she'd share some of the spoils from her trip, so she brought along a bottle of "plum wine" to the party. It was something that her relatives had brewed themselves, so we were definitely getting a unique experience. In fact, it was so unique that...

In case it isn't already patently obvious from some of my posts, I tend to be a bit of a smart aleck ( this is a pretty good example ). I have a quirky sense of humor and I am not afraid to use it. It means that other people bring their wits, too, so it's not at all rare for other people to make fun of me . It comes with the territory, so I don't begrudge anyone their jokes, especially since I tend to find it funny, too. And heck, if I've earned it, I'll take my lumps. Sometimes, though, I get some lumps that I may not have earned. Those are almost always universally amusing, because they involve some sort of wacky misunderstanding or some sort of goofy lead up. These, my friends, are a couple of those stories: A while back, a few of us decided to have lunch together. We needed to settle on a time for lunch, but the other two had relatively free schedules. That left it to me to decide on the time. It just so happened that I was chatting with one of the two lun...

There are quite a few Calvin and Hobbes cartoons that make me laugh, but one of them has always stuck with me. It cracks me up more so than the usual ones. Calvin is standing outside in the snow, and he has shoveled said snow into large piles blocking the driveway, the garage, the front door, and pretty much any useful path into or out of the house. With a very matter of fact tone, he tells Hobbes that if you do something poorly enough the first time, you don't get asked to do it again (I can't find a reputable site that hosts that comic, but you can do a Google image search and it comes up readily enough). It's exactly the sort of smart aleck thing that I would find funny. Anyhow, I also have a few friends with whom I routinely have dinner. They're old friends, and it's good to catch up with them, so we tend to do this fairly regularly. We don't have a go-to spot, either, so we always try to go to a different place. It's more fun that way, since we get t...

Starting a couple of years ago, I resolved to write a blog post at least once a week  (also, holy crap, I can't believe I've been on this schedule for two years now. It really doesn't feel like it's been that long). I remember being slightly concerned that I wouldn't have something to write about every week, so I would have to figure out how to pace my posts. After all, just how amusing could my life be? As it turns out, I've either got more amusing things going on around me or I'm really good at embellishing the mundane things that happen around me . However, I don't always write about these things in the moment. That means that if I don't write them down somehow, I'm liable to forget about them. This is particularly true if I hold off on writing about the amusing anecdote until the following week to make sure I don't fall behind on my schedule. So, I keep a whiteboard and write down things I can write about on it. When it comes time to w...

At work, we tend to hear about cultural differences a lot, since we work with people from lots of different parts of the world. Even if you've never actually had someone tell you this, you probably understand this on a gut level. People from different cultures eat different foods, have different customs, and even ask about different things when it comes to small talk . Now, it's all well and good to understand this on a theoretical level, but it gets far more interesting in practice. I remember the first time I visited the Philippines, some of my coworkers there asked me about my love life within an hour or so of meeting me. They were especially interested to hear about the Filipina Mild-Ex, since that was one of their people. It was all sorts of interesting, and pretty amusing all the way around. More recently, I had some foreign coworkers discuss marriage. One of the guys got engaged recently, and all of the married guys were giving him a hard time. In fact, one of the ma...

A while ago, a buddy of mine invited me along on a hike. A bunch of her other friends were there, and they seemed nice enough, so I made friends with a few of them, as well. Fast forward a couple of months, and the new-found friend asked if I wanted to have dinner with her and the hiking buddy. They wanted to go to a ramen place that was supposed to be really good, so I happily accepted the offer. Little did I know the laughter that would result from this. Shortly after I agreed to go, my hiking buddy commented that she could provide some company on the ride back across the bridge, since she had to come back the same way I was going. A couple of days later, she asked if I would mind giving her a ride back home after dinner. Now, let me be clear: it was all very innocent and given that the we were heading in the same direction, riding together made a lot of sense. Let me also be clear about this, though: I am a smart aleck and I couldn't pass up the chance for some friendly ribbin...

A few weeks back, I made plans to meet up with an old friend over the weekend. We were trying to figure out when schedules would align, and we finally settled on mid-morning on a Sunday. Given that, I figured that brunch of some sort would make sense. She agreed, and she even invited me over to her new condo so I could see the place. I didn't want to impose, but she insisted, so I consented to this plan. Now, I don't generally like to make life harder for my friends, so I figured I would help with said brunch. I brought a bottle of champagne as a house-warming of sorts (also, mimosas with brunch are not unheard of), and I arrived with rolled-up sleeves. I wasn't about to make her slave away in a kitchen in exchange for my company. I'm not nearly that entertaining. Before we actually got down to preparing the meal, we had to figure out what we wanted to eat. There were plenty of options: eggs, bacon, sausage, pancakes, waffles, a fruit compote, and miscellaneous fixi...

A while back, an old friend from out of town suggested that a bunch of us meet up for a meal. It'd been a while since I'd seen some of these folks, so I was quick to agree to this plan. Now, we all grew up together, but we don't all still live in the same city. We're still in the Bay Area, but not in the same city. Ultimately, this would make things very, very interesting. First of all, we had to figure out when we were all free. Frankly, this always feels a little bit like herding cats. I don't think it's necessarily these people that make this task hard, since I've definitely racked up a few interesting stories about coordinating social events with others involved. Still, it took several emails back and forth to settle on a date and time. At one point during the process, I even got yelled at for not responding to the email thread fast enough. Still, we ultimately settled on a date and sorted out what everyone was going to bring. It only took about 80 em...

Do you remember how I switched to a new dentist and ended up liking the place? Well, I still like the place, but after my last visit, I may have to watch myself just a tad. They've got jokes there. It all started with a routine check up. Luckily, my teeth are fine and I don't have any cavities. In fact, I have "nothing on the watch list." I happen to know that that's a good thing, because I specifically asked what that meant (I got curious). Both the dental hygienist and the dentist both reassured me that this was a good thing, so I figure I'm good. They did, however, laugh at my curiosity just a tad. A little while later, the dental hygienist told me that I had to change the way that I brushed my teeth. My usual way looked like it might cause damage to my gums, so she started quizzing me about my technique. I've pretty much been brushing my teeth the same way since I was kid: making circles around my teeth and gums. Her response was the beginning of ...

You know how people in other parts of the world eat far different things? For example, I dare you to find beef anywhere on McDonald's menu in India . The same holds true for different regions or parts of the same country for a large enough country. A coastal region is going to have far more seafood in its repertoire than a land-locked one, and different cultural influences are going to affect the seasoning that the people use. I don't think any of this is particularly surprising for any of you, but just keep all of that in mind for what comes next. I was in Hawaii fairly recently, and my friend and I were looking for a place to eat dinner. We knew exactly where we wanted to go (said travel buddy had been wise enough to look it up ahead of time), but we had a few hours to kill so we had decided to walk around. We didn't really have anywhere to be, so it made sense to take a leisurely stroll. Heck, we found a night-time open-air market, so I'd like to think it was a wi...

Darn near everyone who knows me calls me "Sam." It's how I sign emails, it's how I introduce myself to people, and when I hear that name, I look up. That's not actually my first name, though. I was born as a Samuel, and that's the name that shows up on all of my official documents. So why do I go by a different name, you ask? Well, there's a story behind that, folks. I wasn't born in the United States, and Spanish is my native language. However, I moved here in the middle of what became my kindergarten year, so I had to quickly learn a new language. Still, it took a little bit of time before I picked up the new language. So, for a little while, I was introducing myself as "Samuel," spoken with the accent of a brown person. I don't actually remember doing so, but I'm certain that I must have. That's because my teacher and classmates, bless their hearts, wanted to help me fit in, so they did their level best to try to pronounce my...

A while back, I was traveling through Canada on a vacation. Specifically, I was driving through the Canadian Rockies with a friend. As it turns out, though, driving was going to cause a few laughs. Specifically, it was going to cause a few laughs at my expense. You see, shortly after renting the car, we drove to the hotel. I always get a little wary when I have to drive through unknown territory, but we had a GPS unit, so it was fine. All in all, it was just a matter of following the directions and staying the appropriate lane at the appropriate time. However, we quickly came upon a sign that said something like, "Right Lane: Taxi and Transit." I distinctly remember asking my travel companion if he knew what "Transit" meant. I wasn't sure, and I could've taken it a couple of different ways. Did my rented sedan count as a "transit" vehicle? If so, why call it out in particular? That didn't make any sense. So it must've meant something else...

A little while back, I had to travel. If this was just a single flight or a single trip, it probably wouldn't have been all that noteworthy. In this case, though, I had a couple of trips back-to-back, so that made things a whole heck of a lot more interesting. To begin with, I was flying back to SFO from a work trip fairly late, at 11:30 PM. That wasn't exactly ideal, but that's how it worked out due to circumstances of work meetings. However, I also had to take a flight out the next morning for a personal trip. To be precise, I had to take a flight at 6AM the next morning. That wasn't ideal, either, but circumstances about when I had to land dictated that that was the best flight for me to take. Okay, so I had to take two flights; one of them landed at 11:30PM, and the next one took off at 6AM the next morning. Given that, I figured that the best plan of action for me was to simply stay at the airport until my second flight took off. I didn't think that it made...

You know how some people always seem to have trouble with certain tasks? It's not even a matter of competence, I've seen really, really talented people fail at mundane tasks on a consistent basis. I've also seen incompetent people fail at similar tasks, too, so it really isn't a function of intelligence, education, or darn near anything you can think of. People are just good at different things. Anyhow, for whatever reason, I've always been bad at wedding gifts. Now, if I'm going to a wedding, I care about the people so I will happily get them a gift. I want them to be happy, and I want to help them celebrate. But for whatever reason, I always forget about the gift until the last minute. I know full well that I am going to get the couple a gift, and I want to get them something nice. Still, I always seem to forget to do this in advance.I'd like to think this isn't a result of me being an idiot ( though that's always up for interpretation ), but at ...

Before we start today's post, let me remind you of a couple of facts. First, I have a halfway decent memory , and it likes to put me into situations that result in people laughing at me. Secondly, I like to do my share of online shopping . Up until now, those two things have led to funny stories, but they have always been completely unrelated aspects of my life. No more. See, when I shop for things, I don't always shop for actual items for myself. I have been known to use OpenTable to make reservations at restaurants (occasionally, this can lead to me narrowly avoiding making a fool of myself ), to buy tickets for shows through the venue's website, or to have deliveries sent to other people. I'd like to think that all of this is fairly normal, so it happens pretty frequently. In fact, it happens frequently enough that some of the times it happens involves relationships with women; sometimes the restaurant reservations and tickets are for dates, or the deliveries are ...

I've written plenty about how I've had my share of adventures when going out to eat at restaurants. Sometimes it involves funny exchanges with waiters and waitresses , sometimes the reservation causes some hilarity , and sometimes I gain a dislike for a particular item on a menu. I don't know why, but restaurants always seem to bring about laughs. I have another story to add to the list. I went out to eat at a Japanese restaurant with a bunch of friends, and we all settled down to ponder what we wanted to eat. As is pretty normal, the waitress came over and rattled off the specials. They happened to have a uni (read: sea urchin) special that sounded interesting, and there were a couple of us at the table that had never had it before. As we were discussing the merits of ordering this item, though, the waitress cautioned us that it had something of a unique taste. In short, some people don't like the taste. Well, me being me, that meant that I wanted to try some....

I get up really early to go to work, and it has occasionally led to some interesting stories with guests  and run-ins with the police . Aside from that though, I actually like that getting up so early means I don't have to deal with traffic, and that I can make time to go to the gym. All in all, it's not a bad trade. However, it does mean that I have to plan accordingly. Specifically, it means that I have to try to go to bed earlier than most people. Now, I have long claimed that it's actually pretty easy to get up early, but it's really freaking hard to make yourself go to bed early. The former is just a matter of a deadline. Whether you like it or not, you have to be at work at a specified time. And more than likely, you know exactly how long it takes you to get to work. Given that, it's just a matter of working backwards. Sure, some people use the snooze button liberally, but even so, when push comes to shove, they drag themselves out of bed. It's a matter...

It's that time again, when I remind everyone that little kids are ridiculously fun to be around. Amazingly enough, this is actually the eighth installment in this "series," (if you're curious, here's the last one before this ) which means that I know a bunch of funny little kids. As always, I feel compelled to point out that I'm not actually laughing at the munchkins (I actually tend to get annoyed by people who do). I'm laughing with them, and I always take the opportunity to correct them if it's necessary. It's just hard not to be amused when one of them says something clever or unintended. So, without further ado, I present to you the latest bout of amusement that I've seen: (I am feeling sick, so I go to the fridge to get something to keep myself hydrated) Kid: "Sam, what's that?" Me: "Oh, it's juice" Kid: "Why are you drinking it?" Me: "I feel kind of sick, so I need to drink something....

I always get a laugh out of a good bet. I've been partial to a few good ones over the time that I've been blogging, so I've written about bets for finishing one's meal , running during vacation , and making it to work on a Monday morning . Win, lose, or draw, the bets have always made me laugh. Well, I made another bet that made me laugh, only this time, I ended up laughing at myself. Actually, I made a pair of bets. I was having dinner with a friend who generally doesn't like to be adventurous with food, so somehow we settled on a bet: she had to eat what I ordered for her for one meal. Remember, I'm the kind of person who will intentionally order items on menus that I haven't had before (and being able to roll with the culinary punches has been helpful on at least one occasion), so she really was taking a chance in making this bet. Ultimately, I ordered something fairly tame for her, a fish dish that she normally wouldn't have ordered. Still, it all...

I make no secret of the fact that I have geeky hobbies. I've been known to read comic books and wear associated t-shirts on occasion. I can still be goaded into a Lego competition by little kids, I keep a chess set in the office , and I have a highly developed sense of curiosity that often leads me to learn about random things like cooling a room without air conditioning . Heck, I work as a software developer during the day, so if nothing else, I've got geeky tendencies. None of this is a problem for me, it's just a part of my personality. If others want to judge me based on that, that's their prerogative. I'll happily go on doing my thing. Of course, I purposely said that it's part of my personality. As much as I enjoy doing some of those things, I also think I should try to be a well-rounded human being. The cliche of the absent minded professor is not something I aspire to, and I think people fall into the trap of using that as a crutch. Sure, everyo...

I forget who first mentioned Google Voice to me, but as soon as I heard about it, I liked the idea. It lets you have a phone number that you know will never change, regardless of which carrier you use, what country you're in, or just about any details of your physical presence. You can then have any phone you want ring when you receive calls, so it gives you all sorts of flexibility. It's entirely possible to have people call you and have it make a work phone ring, and then three hours later, have that very same phone number ring totally different number at home. Basically, it gives you more options, so I'm a fan. Well, for the most part. I don't usually mess with the call forwarding aspects of it, but I do like having a web interface for all of my voice mail and text messages. This is particularly useful when I'm at work, since I turn my phone notifications off when I'm there. I can switch over to a different tab to check in on messages when I know I have ...

People who have talked to me in the recent past know that my allergies have been acting up far more than usual lately. I've never really been a sickly person, but I have been sniffly and congested more in the last few months than in the last few years before that, combined. What makes the whole experience so bad is that it makes you unfit to be in public (do *you* want to hang out with someone liable to get snot on you?) and it makes you feel miserable. I started taking medicine on a daily basis to try to keep it under control, but every now and again, it would still flare up. Worse yet, it was entirely unpredictable. I've had myself tested to try to determine to what I was allergic, but nothing conclusively really came up (dust mites, pollen). I dusted and vacuumed regularly to try to prevent any of that from building up and causing problems, but every now and then, my sinuses would just decide to rebel for no apparent reason. I also know that although I can handle the col...

I'm not exactly a rookie at weddings; I'm old enough where I've been to a wedding or two . You get the person a gift, you go to the celebrations, you (usually) wear a suit or a tux, and you have a good time celebrating with someone you care about. Sure, the details change for each and every wedding, but it's not like I suddenly have to learn a new language or stand on my head in order to go to a wedding. My point is, if you've been to a few weddings, you can fall on past experience to understand what's going on. Several years back, my I went to a wedding for a friend that I've nicknamed " Mom ." I didn't know many other people there, but remember, this was someone I called "Mom." There was no way that I wasn't going to go to this wedding. And as it turned out, one of my good friends was also knew Mom, so the two of us went to this wedding together. Anyhow, the actual ceremony was in a garden setting, so we all walked up and wai...

A long time ago, I remarked that my sister thinks I read very quickly . It's one of those things that I've apparently done for a very long time, but I've never really spent much time thinking about it. It's not like it's ever made much of a difference one way or the other. Until recently, that is. A shorter time ago, my brother and sister got me some comic books for my birthday. Well, to be precise, they got me the comic books a few days before my birthday, so I was pleasantly surprised. What's more, they'd actually gone back to a Secret Santa wish list from years past to figure out which ones I thought would be interesting (clever of them, I must say), so I was even more pleasantly surprised. In fact, I was so pleased by the gift, that I was reading them within the hour. Now, just to give you an idea of how much there was to read, one of these was an inches-thick anthology. It was easily several hundred pages long. Even if you account for the fact that th...

One of the funniest things I have ever heard come out of a kid's mouth is that lunch was her favorite part of the day . That wasn't the only kid to say something to that effect, either. I've heard other kids say some variation of, "this food is awesome" enough times to realize that my mom is a legitimately good cook. It's actually gotten to the point where my mom has a reputation among the parents; they're always excited when she cooks for a function, since they know it will be quality food. As it turns out, this seems to run in the family. It's just not the same type of reputation. I've always treated cooking as a bit of a chore. Don't get me wrong, I can appreciate a good meal, but my criteria for what to prepare have always involved speed of preparation and simplicity. As I like to say, I can cook well enough to stave off starvation. I know this isn't going to impress anyone any time soon, but it's yet to cause me any grief. And ...

I've probably mentioned the CrossFit workouts I do on occasion over time; it's something I've enjoyed doing for a while and something that I like to talk about. It's not all that rare for me to describe the whole thing to someone with obvious enthusiasm in my voice. Like I said, it's something I like doing. In fact, it's something I like doing enough that I try to keep that linked blog up to date as much as possible. I'm hardly perfect, but I do try to post the work outs before the week is up, at the very least. I don't entirely remember when it became a part of my routine, but at some point, it just became one of those things that I had to get done. Sure, other people can update the blog, and they've done it before. Still, that responsibility has fallen to me often enough that I try to post the work outs when I know what they are. It's almost a matter of habit at this point. Regardless, I know that it's hard to figure out how movements ...

Lately, I've been pretty bad about exercising consistently. There are a bunch of reasons, but I'll readily admit that laziness is a part of it. It's easy to fall into bad habits, and there have been a few occasions where I simply didn't feel like pushing myself. Don't get me wrong, I'm still eating relatively well and trying to take care of myself, I just haven't been working out with my usual gusto. I'm a creature of habit, though, so I know I'll get back to the routine soon enough. Part of the reason why I'm not overly concerned is that I have a lot of people around me who set good examples. No one in my immediate family has ever been the type to gorge themselves on deep fried donuts, so I've always known what a healthy diet looked like, almost unintentionally. Secondly, I have a bunch of friends who exercise regularly, and they do all sorts of fun-sounding activities. I have friends who compete in martial arts competitions, climb Kiliman...