Confession is Good for the Soul

I have this little confession to make. I like Bill Engvall. He cracks me up. Have you ever seen his show where he talks about being 15 degrees off cool? I so relate to that. It seems like no matter how hard I try to be non-dorkish (that's a new word from Pam's Thesaurus) - I somehow seem to miss the mark. I'm choosing to look at it as one of my most endearing qualities. This is on my mind because I had a super not-cool moment Friday evening. But, before I tell you about that - would you like to be embarrassed with me? They say confession is good for the soul, right? Who are "they", anyhow?

Go with me back in time...the year is 2000. I am pregnant with Little Britches. I work at MidFlorida Federal Credit Union. I was told I was having a girl. SURPRISE! Anyhow, from the time I was a little girl myself I was picking out baby names. Easy, right? Up until there was going to be a real person attached to that name - for ever, that is. We were hitting a brick wall with boy names. Thank God we were having a "girl". We knew we wanted to use a Biblical name. That made narrowing down the 48 bazillion names out there a little easier. We finally settled on 'Chloe'. So, one day I am at work with my very pregnant self when Sister Wine comes up to me. Sister Wine was a very nice woman who raised her children with her husband in Nicaragua for about 2 and a half decades. Brother Wine was responsible for establishing churches all over that country. A couple of years earlier we had taken our youth group on a mission trip with him there. It had been a while since I had seen them and we were catching up on all the the customary pregnancy chit chat. Of course, Sister Wine wanted to know the sex of the baby and if we had picked out a name.

"Chloe".

"That's a Bible name, isn't it?"

"Yes! It is!" And that's where I should have stopped talking. But did I? Nooooo. I continued, "We knew we wanted a name from the Bible, but didn't want something so common like, Mary, or something that sounded really old and ugly like, Esther."

"Well, good luck. Blah, blah, blah. Or something like that."

I finished her transaction and she left to go wait with her husband and a pretty young woman over in customer service. A little while later she comes back over with this lovely lady and says, "Pam, I don't think you've ever met my daughter. This is Esther."

I immediately had a donkey's head on my shoulders and was braying as loudly as I could. Heehaw! Heehaw! I was totally eating my big, fat, swollen, pregnant foot.

Jezebel. Why couldn't I have used the name Jezebel? Why did I have to use a name at all?

Brain cells don't seem to work like they're supposed to when you're pregnant, right? So, could I possibly blame that horrid moment on the pregnancy? Maybe. But, I was not pregnant during my next shining moment.

Fast forward about two and a half years. We have just started attending Word of Life Christian Center. The sweet people there decided to have a little pitch-in at one of their houses after church on a Sunday night and invite us so we can get to know some people. I still miss (and keep in contact with) many of the friends we made while we were there. Enter - Bo and Debbie. Debbie is the church secretary. Bo is the praise and worship leader. Bo is short. Really, really short. I am 5 foot 3 and 3/4 inches and am quite a bit taller than he is. So, he was probably only 5'1" or 5'2" on a good day - and maybe weighed 125 pounds. I'm guessing there, but he wasn't a large fellow at all. Momentary bunny trail...the pastor was as big as Bo was small. He was 6'4" and of a large frame. It was so funny when Bo was leading from the behind the pulpit and Pastor Dave came up in front of him to say something or do announcements or whatever. Bo would completely disappear! I'm not kidding. It was like, "POOF. Where did he go?" Back to my story. So, we are at these people's house and are in the kitchen getting our food. Bo is right in front of me and mentioned that his wife had made the Shrimp Gumbo because it was his favorite and named after him. A little confused? I was. So, I should have smiled politely and something like, "Oh, how nice." But did I? Nooooo. I looked at him all stupid like and said, "Shrimp?" The look on his face is permanently seared into my conscience. Then he says, "No. Bo." Heehaw! Heehaw! I once again managed to make a donkey of myself.

Sometimes the filter on my mouth just doesn't work in time. I will say, though, this IS something I have really worked on since those ridiculously incommodious days. Now I try to think before I speak. What a novel idea!

Friday night's offense wasn't of a verbal nature. It was harebrained, none-the-less. Chris had bought some lumber after work and brought it home in one of his work vans. We were going to his boss' house for dinner, so we decided that he would take the van back to work on the way and I would follow him in the Explorer. Simple enough, right? Unless you're me. He is behind me in the driveway, so he backs out first. I watch him back out. I don't, however, watch him stop. I'm too busy trying to make sure I don't plow into the tree. I plow into my husband instead. Yes. It's official. I am a certifiable D.O.R.K.

Thank God, it didn't really do any damage. We were needing to get the Explorer repainted anyway. NO! I'm just joking. We weren't planning on getting the Explorer repainted. For real, though. The Explorer doesn't need repainted. Not from me plowing into my baby's work van, anyway. The factory paint job peeling off the roof is another story. Crappy warranty.

So, there you go. My secret is out. I like Bill Engvall and I am a dork.

I hope your mouth filter works much better than mine.