Firstly, Feathernester totally called me out on my empty fridge yesterday...without having read my post. We spent a solid half an hour trying to understand why her fridge is always devoid of space and mine is always devoid of food. It was good times, folks.
Secondly, this morning, Feathernester and I discussed the three most embarrassing moments of my life. I will now share, but I fully expect to get some funny stories in the comments to this post. If no one shares, I will declare you all chickens, and I will make my daughter make chicken noises at you every time she sees you. Here goes:
1. Those of you in KY know that the town to the west of Lexington is Versailles. Those of you outside of KY would think this is pronounced like the French city and palace. It's not pronounced that way in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. There, it's ver-sales. It took some getting used to. Anyway, back when I was a working stiff, I had to call a company that we had ordered some nursery furniture from. One of the items was the Versailles crib. I was on the phone with someone there, and I asked about our "ver-sales" crib. Then I mentally crawled into a hole to die as the woman explained to me that it is pronounced the French way. I seriously wanted to die. I probably should've gone home sick at that point. I can't believe I'm admitting this on the internet.
2. When I was a working stiff in Memphis, I was making phone calls to musicians about playing the Blues Ball. On my list of calls to make, most of the numbers had a corresponding name of an assistant or manager to talk to. I knew most of them. Unfortunately, BB King (yes, that BB King) was on the list, and there was no one listed to ask for. I didn't notice that until I had already dialed the number and someone answered. I got all tongue-tied, and I asked to speak to BB. Just like that. "Um, is BB available?" I'm pretty sure I remember the guy who answered laughing out loud as he did a mental eye roll and said no. Like, who just calls seriously famous people and asks to talk to them? Apparently, I do. So, if anyone out there has Robert Pattinson's number, just pass it along. I'll tell him you said hi as I get laughed at for being a total idiot.
3. This is truly the worst one, and it's a Memphis story, too. When the Memphis Zoo was getting their pandas, it was a HUGE deal. FedEx had a special plane and a panda tracker online. Everyone was talking about it. Everyone. So, I woke up one morning, and as I was listening to the radio, getting ready for the same job that I didn't get fired from for asking for BB in front of my boss (I think I forgot to mention that part.), I kept hearing about some emergency situation with the pandas. Apparently, the pandas arrived a day early, and as they were transferring them from the plane to the vans, they got loose! They had run and they were in Shelby Park. There was, luckily, a group of high school students at the park, and they had surrounded the pandas and were waiting for someone to come and get them. There were people calling into the radio station who claimed you could see the whole ordeal from the road. "OHMIGOD," thought I. "How could this happen? Does Fred Smith (Mr. FedEx president and CEO) know?" I had to call my boss. She would know what was happening. After all, she and Mr. Smith were like totally best friends. She was in New York for the week, but I called her and woke her up. She said she'd call me back...she'd call Fred. Then I called M, who worked for FedEx at the time.
Okay, here's where it gets really good.
I relayed the whole story to M. Then he very calmly said, "Ouiser, do you know what today's date is?"
"April 1st."
"And?"
"Oh, shit. I called PAT!"
I hung up, and I frantically called my boss, who had already called Mr. Smith. It's safe to say that the words she used were not flattering, ladylike, or kind. It was not a red letter day for me.
So, there you have it. The most mortifying moments of my life thus far. Having read over them, it would seem that I should avoid the use of telephones forever. I should also avoid having jobs. Both phones and employment lead to utter humiliation.
Happy weekending.
3 comments:
Oh, dear. You are very, very brave. I cringe when I think of the most embarrassing moment for me [sigh], but I guess confession is good for the soul:
When I was about 11, my favorite book was A Little Princess. They have some pretty old-timey language in this book, obviously. Well, I was at dinner at Perkins with my dad, and somehow as he was talking to the waitress, he was sort of quoting himself and said, "I exclaimed!" I wanted to join in, so I used a phrase I'd read in my book: "You ejaculated!" The waitress choked with laughter and quickly walked away. My dad asked me where I'd heard that word and I told him, and he very kindly told me that that word wasn't used any more in that way and that it had another meaning which wasn't as nice.
Of course, I didn't figure out until a few years later what I had done; I think I was mostly worried I'd said it wrong, but I knew I'd said something I shouldn't.
So there it is. S cannot call me chicken after admitting THAT.
I am tempted to send you a "Where's the Panda's" email.
In order to save face to S...
M.G. came into my office and was chatting away and before leaving he posed like he was holding a football (in that trophy sort of way) and I asked him why he was standing like the "HYMEN" trophy. He stopped the stance immediately and I knew it had come out wrong. I knew what I was talking about, but "HEISMAN" just wouldn't come out..I still haven't lived that one down at work.
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