I would have strangled him on the spot!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Friend Across Town told me an anecdote this evening at which I am still laughing. We were sharing stories about family members not listening to us. Like when I asked my mom, more than once, to “hang on to that case of New Coke when you move, because I actually like it!” Three months later when I turned up at their new digs, I inquired after the New Coke and was informed, “I threw it away. You said you didn’t like it!” Or when Friend asked his mom to get green olives with pimentos for his graduation party. All of a sudden, she’s insisting that he loves black olives. After about five repetitions of his telling her he has always preferred pimento olives and has never even had a black olive, she concedes, “Well, if you want to try pimento olives, I can get a jar…” (No, the party was not going to succeed or fail on the strength of the olive selection. But jeez, where was she all those years when he was snacking on pimento olives?)

But the capper was the following. Friend will be referred to as Jeff; his brother as Mutt. They are 12 (brother) and 14 (Friend), in what was known at the time as a “record store”.

“Jeff” was and is a collector of pre-rock music. He found a single of a song called “If You Don’t Know Me By Now” by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, and grabbed it up.

Mutt: Why you getting that?

Jeff: I’ve been looking for it for a long time.

Mutt: Yeah, but why are you buying it?

Jeff: Huh?

Mutt: We have a copy at the house.

Jeff: We do?!

Mutt: Yeah! I’ll show you when we get home.

Jeff: You’re sure now.

Mutt: Positive.

Jeff: Well, I think I know our record collection pretty well, but okay.

Mutt: No, for sure we have it. Wait till we get home.

Jeff: Must be one of mom’s that she keeps in that carrying case…

At home, Mutt flips through the record rack, supposedly in search of “If You Don’t Know Me By Now” by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. “Aha!” Triumphantly, he pulls out a copy of…

…“Last Night I Didn’t Get To Sleep At All” by the Fifth Dimension.

WTFF?!

After I stopped laughing and picked myself up off the floor, I asked Jeff if the two records perhaps had a similar label. No such thing, he assured me. Totally different labels, both in appearance and the corporate sense. Different groups, different eras, and the titles don’t have even one word in common! Jeff says he still has no idea, beyond the fact that his brother is a moron (scientifically proven in other situations), how he could have been so utterly mistaken. Happy ending, though: he went back to the shop and the record was still there. Oh, and their mom made Mutt apologize.

I swear, if I ever hear that Fifth Dimension song again, I will rupture myself laughing. (Not much chance that I’ll hear the Blue Notes song, or recognize it if I do.)

2

I recently was lamenting to my Mother-In-Law about how I always seemed to get pajamas as gifts, and how I always hated them, I am picky about pajamas. I told her about her ex-husband’s family in particular had given me 3 sets, and how all of them were completely not-me (not to mention they must have forgotten the other 2 sets I had already gotten from them).

A while later I came across a pair in the closet and was saying to my husband how I was going to go out and pick up some new pajamas myself, and to please tell his family if they asked him for ideas for my upcoming birthday to tell them not to buy me pajamas. No one is to buy pajamas for me, ever. No pajamas. . He looked a little uneasy, then proceeded to tell me my Mother-In-Law had bought pajamas for my birthday. I laughed, sure he was kidding. He said he wasn’t, but I continued to believe he was joking until I opened my new pair of baby-blue plaid pajamas, complete with pom-pom flower slippers.

Aaargh. Anyone need some pajamas?

3

I’m not sure if this fits, but my mom is always telling me what I said, and it’s never what I said. For example, she was going to the grocery store and I asked her to buy lunch meat for me and she replied with, “I’m going to the grocery store, not the bank.” Huh? She insisted that I had asked her to deposit a check for me. For a long time I wondered if I might actually be loosing my mind. Why else would I be saying things that are so completely different from what I ment to say, but then I came to the conclusion that it’s my mother who’s reality impaired.

4

Well, I have to tell this story.

When I was a teenager in the late 60s, my mother asked me what I wanted for my birthday. I told her I wanted the new album by Cream. She laughed, thinking the name was even more ridiculous than most band names.

A few days later we were in my grandmother’s apartment (she lived downstairs). My mother said, laughing, “Guess what your grandson wants for his birthday! The Creampuffs!” I just rolled my eyes at how out-of-it she was. I wasn’t paying much attention when my grandmother looked doubtful, and said, “Well, they are a lot of trouble. But maybe . . .”

So what did I get on my birthday? A big tray of creampuffs, presented by my beaming grandmother!

5

Rilchiam I’m sure you’d recognize the song, but if you hear it, you’ll think of Teddy Pendergrass (which it is) he was the lead on that song, before he split the group to go solo. Here’s the lyrics

6

Incidentally, the above song was also covered by Simply Red (as the lyrics linked reference) and it’s the version I’ve now got running through my head right now.

That is, when the stupid Fifth Dimension song isn’t pulsing through it!

7

Aw… now that is really sweet! Truly a chicken-soup-for-the-soul kind of story.

I never asked my parents to get me music or anything else that would be crucial to my coolness (or lack thereof) at school. Too risky!

Leifsmama, we must be siblings. My mother rarely ever caught what I was saying. I don’t know why. She has been much better since she retired. I think she used to work so hard and was always a little bit preoccupied so she was hearing me, but not listening.

8

Thanks, Stuffy, and sorry, scout! If it’s any consolation, the 5D song is also stuck in my head. Except I only know the first line, which makes it marginally worse. And to top it off, I keep getting it crossed with “Just One Look” by Doris Troy! “Last night, I didn’t get to sleep at all, no, no…with you…ohhhh, ohhhh…”

9

The old supervisor in our department would tell us to do certain tasks, then weeks or months later swear that she “never said that! It’s always been done this way!” She’d insist that some process we would do was never done the way we were doing it, but notes in the process logs showed that they were – with her initials! I started keeping her e-mails as a record.

The vice president of our department had similar memory lapses. Once we were in a staff meeting and she was saying something that everyone knew was incorrect. I’d brought an e-mail from her that she’d sent some time previously that contradicted what she was saying in the meeting, and I brought it up. Man, did she turn all red and blotchy! LOL

That was a few of years ago. The supervisor eventually transferred to a non-supervisory position and was later laid off in one of the RIFs. The VP was demoted to Manager when her RIF’d department dwindled, and I believe she was eventually laid off as well.