Sometimes I think sitting down as a family at dinner is overrated. At least for the mother. I miss my university days of having a bagel and Sunchips in front of the TV with my roommate while watching Jeopardy and reruns of The Muppets.
Now, in our Lego filled house, dinner table conversations sometimes seem like a script written for Henson’s furry creatures. Or maybe for frat boys.
Here is the scene that unfolded over burgers and salad last week, moments after Vivian did an elaborate pantomime to inform me that I had lettuce stuck between my teeth.
William was taking apart his burger so that he could eat the bun with ketchup and chase it down with a slab of ground beef. As he does whenever he’s happy, he hummed.
“William,” my husband said, “stop humming.”
William looked up from his ketchup fest. “Dad, why don’t you like humming?”
“It’s not that I don’t like humming,” he explained. “I just don’t like it at the dinner table.”
Three sentences had been uttered so Vivian was overdue for a contribution. “Birds sing while they’re eating,” she said.
It was a logical comparison. Even insightful. But for some reason I said this:
My husband looked up from his burger and offered a warning. “Vivian, watch out. You’re bringing a knife to a gun fight.”
Now tell me what bizarre things you’ve said or heard recently.
Or what shows you watched in college.
Or your favourite Muppet.
Or something even more random.
Around the blogosphere:
Speaking of non-sequiturs, funny man Bryan Allain has released a book called 31 Days To Finding Your Blogging Mojo. It’s on my Kindle. If you want to laugh and learn something, get it.
Kelly K from Dances with Chaos has a terrific post called Pay It Forward. Go read it and consider paying something forward this week. It’s a perfect idea for the week following 9/11.
My favourite muppet is the phantom , never went to collage, I’m in the military so hear lots of buzzer things ( usually from our bosses in Ottawa ) and life is very random every day with 2 teenaged daughters in the house
I can only imagine how random life is. Maybe you feel like you have Animal in your house? 🙂
You know what’s so funny about this? Talking about cats licking their butts at the table is so much worse than humming!!!! We are funny creatures, we parents.
That’s so true. We are funny creatures. I keep thinking if I act strange my kids will act normally. Not quite sure it’s working…
Said in a rest stop stall somewhere in Texas to my daughter in the stall next to me:
“Wow, it sounds like you really had to go. Aren’t you glad you decided use the bathroom?”
Only it wasn’t my daughter.
That is hilarious, in that mortifying-at-first way. What did she reply? I’m still laughing, by the way!
Dead silence from the other stall. Which really made me think it was my teenaged-daughter since most of what I say receives this response.
I didn’t know it wasn’t her until I left the bathroom and saw her walking the dog. I suddenly had a vision of turning around and seeing whomever it was behind me so I did what any reasonable person would do. I ran like hell.
In college about 10 girl friends crammed into one dorm room every week to watch Temptation Island. That was the show where they put several couples on an island and then split them up to see if they’d cheat on each other.
My roomie and I also watched a lot of SpongeBob.
My favorite muppets were Gonzo and Beaker. Hopefully that will redeem me from watching Temptation Island.
I’m sorry, Thoughtsy, but nothing will redeem that show.
(cough cough . . . I might have watched it too . . . cough cough)
Gonzo and Beaker redeem you (of course, I haven’t seen Temptation Island…)
Miss Piggy is my favorite Muppet. She is tres chic. How can you not love her, even when she is karate-chopping someone.
Agreed. And she had attitude!
Sometimes I embarrass the kids on purpose. Isn’t that our parental right? Whenever my 8yr old girl is whiny in public, and says..”But Mom…” I turn to her and say rather loudly, “Did you just call me a Buttmom??” rather sternly, but with a hint of sarcasm. She sheepishly smiles and changes her tone.
I’m stealing that, Maria. Fabulous!
Knife to gunfight indeed. That one made me laugh. I’m saving my Muppet breakdown for a future post I’ve been working on for six months. You can’t have it.
Fine. Be that way. 😉
We were enjoying our normal, large family get-together for Christmas one year. Our discussion was about Radio Frequency Interference (I am a ham radio operator) getting into various pieces of electronics. My married sister spoke up in a silent moment: “Maybe that’s what’s wrong with Les’s organ.” The silence was deafening – for about three heartbeats.
Hilarious. I love those double ententres!
I believe it was this past Sunday; my family had gone shopping at Sam’s Club. My 5yo said something about needing to go “poop;” to which I replied, “I just took you to the potty at Sam’s Club. You just pooped… Hey, son did you know that there are officially seven different kinds of poop? Let me show you on Wikipedia.”
So I got my smartphone, and loaded:
Bristol Stool Scale
Mind you, he said he didn’t want to see it, but being a 13yo boy, he looked.
It was a short time later that I told him, “Mom says we’re having sausages for dinner.” (See the link for why this traumatized the poor boy).
I should’ve known someone classfied poop. Lucky number 7. Or not. And I’ll pass on the sausage. (Or should I say, pass the sausage?)
Mahna mahna (do DO do do do)
Love it. And that’s pleasantly stuck in my head!
Ralph, the dog. He never licked his butt. Of course he probably had a hand up it.
Oh, this made me laugh…
Very very funny. I love me a good pun. 🙂
Let’s see.. college. I watched La Femme Nikita, the Weather Channel, and the X-files. When I lived in the dorms, we’d all gather in a room right before dinner and watch The Simpsons – at the guys dorm where all of my friends lived.
Animal has always been my favorite muppet. And Sweetums.
I love the monsters. 🙂
X-Files. Good one. Which makes me think of Star Trek, in the guys’ dorm of course!
I won’t steal Clay’s thunder, so I’ll just say at least your children are not speaking in binary. That’s what I’ve got going on. And I have no idea how to make it stop. 1-1-0-1-2-1-0-0-0-1.
Whaaaat?
Here you go, Renee: http://www.roubaixinteractive.com/PlayGround/Binary_Conversion/Binary_To_Text.asp
Am I supposed to understand what that is? Ricky’s code-breaker might help. I’m glad my kids are still 7. Sort of.
thanks for the link, Leanne!
and for the record, I love toilet talk when we’re at the table at our house. As long as we remind the kids that they can’t do it elsewhere (they’re 8 and 10) it’s one of those things that makes our family goofy and unique, and I want them to feel special about that. Kinda weird, but oh well.
Wish I could have seen that conversation!
Bryan: Kids, there’s a time and place for potty talk. The only appropriate places for potty talk are: The potty. Oh, and the dinner table. Cool?
Parker: *Farting noises*
Ya both are cracking me up. I’m not sure I’m coming over for dinner. Well…maybe…
I pretty much hate mealtime. I’m almost at the point of giving him atrocious little bars for every meal.
Just go out and leave Theo with M. 🙂
…And now I know why we don’t have cats.
However, we DO have a dog who likes to sleep on back with her legs up in the air and spread wide.
My husband loves to point her out and say, “Such a lady. Just like Mommy.”
To my kids.
Nice.
Your husband is hilarious. Not as funny as you, of course…
hahahahahahahahahaha
YES.
Do it!
So funny, it really made me laugh out loud.
🙂
My mother used to tell me if I sing at the table, I’m going to marry an old man. Did Not Work.
I like empty threats. I’m working on a degree in them. Your mother and I would get along…
I have read hair. Animal has redhair. I have always felt like I might be his lovechild.
Lovechild: bwahaha.
We were doing our weekly shopping. I pick healthy food and my husband eats junk. We parked the cart and I went to pick out some frozen vegetarian chili. Rick wandered over to the ice cream freezer. After perusing a few varieties, I picked one and dropped it in the cart. I offered, “I didn’t get one for you because the last time I did I had to wear a gas mask for three days.”
He always has some smart alec reply at the ready and when I didn’t hear a retort, I turned around and peered into the maw of a VERY SHOCKED man. It wasn’t my husband and it wasn’t my cart. I was internally mortified but I picked the chili out of the cart and without hesitation said, “You’re a MAN, you know what I mean.” He smiled meekly and left skid marks on the floor as he fled to the next aisle.
We’re shopping elsewhere for a while. 😉
That has me LMAO.
And at least the skid marks were on the floor. 😉
In college we would gather around a small tv to watch Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.
And you shouted. I’m betting you shouted…
I’m jealous of what you said. Mind if I borrow it? One of the older kids started a round of truly tasteless and offensive jokes that I was horrified at but also laughing so hard I was unable to speak, which made the little guy pay attention. We spent the next half hour convincing him he would go to jail if he told any of these jokes in school.
The Jail Card. Hmm. Mind if I borrow that? 🙂
My favorite was Animal. Funny you should bring up the muppets. I was riding in the combine with Randy this evening and he said name 10 Muppets, I could only name 8. Did the old guys in the balcony have names?
The Hecklers – Statler and Waldorf
Kelly’s got the names. To me, they were–as you said–the old guys in the balcony. And I loved them! (Hope the combining’s going well!)
My kids start singing at the table and it drives me nuts. I tell them no singing at the table. But that just makes them want to do it more. Or some other equally obnoxious thing. Dinner time is my Vietnam.
This morning my youngest was dancing down the hall singing “party in the USA.” When I asked him what he was doing, he said “singing Miley Cyrus.” Well, at least they are learning the important stuff. Blech!! Oh, and the oldest at breakfast was humming Bad Romance, and the little one goes “that’s Lady Gaga!!!” Like I said, important.
We used to watch Friends. The original broadcasts, back when thursday night was Must See TV. That and Seinfeld.
Yes, remember the Thursday night line up? NBC owned it then.
“Dinner time is my Vietnam” = brilliant.
In university, I used to eat breakfast while watching Regis and Kathy Lee. Sweet Jesus, that’s sad. And, yes, Kathy Lee – I am that old.
I remember Kathy Lee. Is it me, or is Regis as annoying now as he was then?
i work from home, so my kids know to interrupt me at their own risk. from the time they were little, if they had to ask me a question, i would answer it then say, “i love you, go away.”
they now expect me to say it. if i don’t, they wait until i do.
Okay, I’m stealing that.
Thanks for stopping by and commenting!
Animal. Definitely Animal.
Can I make up a question to go with that comment? 😉
What…no one else likes Kermit???
I laughed more while reading this post and all the comments than I have in a while. Thanks Leanne & Company!
Jodi
I heart Kermit. And yes, the comments are hilarious! Love my readers.
I know ALL about this topic…