Mild Amusement

My sister doesn't live in the same state as I do, so it's always good when she visits. We usually end up hanging out at least part of the time, and it's good to catch up. Sometimes, it leads to a little bit of hilarity because I let her use my room (I get up really early and don't want to wake her by walking through her sleeping area). Either way, it's pretty much always a good time. Well, she and her husband visited recently. There was a lot of the usual banter about life and people we knew, but one exchange in particular stood out. See, my brother-in-law works for a company based in the Bay Area. He was flying in for work, so my sister decided to tag along on the trip and visit family (i.e., us) while he was there. However, since he was in the area for work, his company put him up in a hotel. Given that they'd already paid for the room, he planned on using it the whole time. It just sort of made sense. Now, my mom had assumed that both my sister and my br...

I wear cologne. That in it of itself isn't too funny, though the process of purchasing it has led to more than a few laughs in the past. Luckily, I usually buy big enough containers of my cologne so that I don't have to go through that process very often. As it turns out, though, I'm starting to run out of my usual cologne. Yup, it's time for another cologne purchasing post. First of all, I was toying with the idea of getting a different scent. I like the scent I have now, but I've been wearing it for a while. Maybe it was a grass-is-always-greener thing, or maybe my natural curiosity was kicking in. Either way, I was thinking of trying something else, so I mentioned it to the Mild Girlfriend while we were out shopping. It turned out that she liked my cologne more than I did, so her vote was to keep going with the current scent. In fact, she dubbed it my "signature scent" (hence the title of this post). Well, then. If you put it like that, I pretty m...

If you've shared a meal with me, there are about 50/50 odds that you've heard some variation of the " come y calla " story. It just sort of naturally comes up, because I do eat pretty much anything. And heck, it's a funny story. On the other hand, there are some folks who are picky about their food. As you can imagine, it gets very interesting when these people get paired up with me or my siblings. Well, guess what? My brother and sister both married people who are somewhat picky eaters. I sort of take it for granted that we're going to have a broader palette than most people, but they're also on the other side of the norm. So, if we're below average in terms of being exacting about our food, they're both above average. As you can imagine, this has led to a few amusing exchanges. Now, both of my siblings' spouses recognize that they don't eat the same things that we do. They also have senses of humor about the whole thing, so they poke ...

Once, a very long time ago, I was eating chicken wings with a bunch of other friends. It wasn't a particularly special meal, it just involved a few people hanging out and breaking bread together. The reason I remember this meal, however, was one particular line of banter from the conversation. I don't quite remember why, but we were eating bone-in, traditional wings. In hindsight, I'd like to believe that everyone had accepted the universal truth that bone-in wings tasted better (that's my story, and I'm sticking with it). In the process of chowing down, though, we set up a central plate where everyone discarded all of the left-over bones. It was almost an after-thought, just to make sure we all had room on our plates to keep eating. It ultimately led to hilarity. Now, everyone has a different definition of when they've eaten all of the meat off of the wing. Some people like to eat every last scrap of meat. You can literally feel the smoothness of the bone i...

A while back, my extended family and I started a fantasy football league . The first two weeks alone were full all of sorts of shenanigans, and that prompted me to write a blog post about it. Well, it's been a lot longer than two weeks, and I thought I should report out on how it all turned out. First of all, my sister in law won the whole thing. Yup, I called it and/or jinxed myself back with that very first post. As it turned out, the stars aligned in the right way so that she won. Mind you, she was really getting into it, so I was amused the whole way through. I remember getting text messages in the middle of football games, and she definitely kept track of which team was playing at which time. That alone was amusing, but the contrast with her past record of hating (her word, not mine) football was what really put it over the top. It was hilarious to watch. Now, the other thing to keep in mind was that there were two married couples in the running. I hadn't really though...

Since I am around a fair number of munchkins, I am a part of their dealings. I play with them, I read to them, and I teach them stuff. Basically, I am just another part of their world. That's great, but it comes with all of the other trappings of their worlds, too. That involves playing by their rules, and abiding by their justice system, too. Essentially, it's possible for one of them to tell on me . And if I'm just lucky enough, this will happen with more than one kid, on more than one occasion (hint: I am that lucky). Let's start with the part that's my fault: I will occasionally stick out my tongue at one of the little kids. It's all in fun, and it's more like a game than anything else (think Peek-a-boo). In fact, they always laugh about it. It's not a malicious thing, even though we know it's not something you're supposed to do in polite company. Still, it was just one of those things that I do, and everyone has a good laugh about it. Re...

Last time on this Bat-channel , I mentioned that the Mild Girlfriend and I spent some time in Colorado a few weeks back.  We managed to get some fun pictures, though I also managed to scratch up my hand and bang up my knee. Still, our trip was not all about hiking and injuries. No, there was a beanie involved, too. First off, let me start off by explaining that a good friend of mine recently had a son. It was his second son, in fact. Since I've known him for so long, he's met my parents, and they're somewhat fond of him. So, when my mom heard that he was having a kid, she was really happy for him. In fact, she was so happy about this turn of events that she dedicated some time to making the newborn a beanie, baby clothes, and baby booties. Yes, I said "make;" she crocheted all of these things. My buddy and his wife were quite thrilled with the gift(s), and I even heard his wife comment that she wished they still fit the older son at one point. Basically, it wa...