Tell the truth and shame the devil. When I was a teenager, I ate dinner with my aunt at the Avalon Mall in Newfoundland. I ordered a pork chop with mashed and peas. The waitress forget to give me a steak knife and, rather than ask her for one, I used the butter knife in a vain attempt to cut the chop. While I was wrestling with the chop, it slide off the plate and went flying like a hockey puck to the floor. OMG I wanted to hide under the table.
Another time, I wore heels to a fancy eatery here in the city. Big mistake for me to wear heels....I am like a bull in a china shop. I was going to the washroom which was situated near the swinging doors to the gormet kitchen....cold kitchen...when I tripped. For a while, I thought I was going to get my balance back but no such luck. I went barreling through the swinging doors into the kitchen. Thank God I knew the chefs and they knew what a klutz I was lol.
One that immediately comes to mind happened in Duluth, Minnesota...North Superior Avenue, a Bridgemann's Restaurant...all these pretty Norwegian waitresses...(a tangent)...ummm, I'm working as a busboy, two-tone uniform, walk out to the eating area, pick up the plastic bins where the waitresses have placed dishes--they cleaned the tables etc--I just loaded the dishwasher after hosing off the plates, cups, glass...and...I had to keep this cooler in the front stocked. They made their own ice cream, milk, cheese. Usually...or, all the time, one could access the cooler through a door in the back, instead of walking through where customers are seated at the counter.
But this once, one of the cooks (who had a real bitchin car) comes to the door on the restaurant side and props it open while I'm in there. That should have been my first clue...the second clue was the sheet-eating grin he had on his face...then...a few minutes later, he closes the door I used, throws a bar through the handles so it can't be opened from my side...and starts yodeling at the top of his lungs...all those cute Norwegian waitresses looked my way...in my two-tone uniform and single-tone face...plus, a handful of customers at the counter and several at tables...all turned to see who the idiot yodeling in the cooler is...the cook is cackling behind the bolted door...
But later on...Kierra & Keeley said they really admire a man who can yodel as I did. So...all was well and all manner of things were well.
well .... I looked about to see who was looking, luckily it was dark and I think only one creepy neighbor saw me ... I had my arms full of stuff and couldn't pull them up, stepped out of them and kept on trucking .... LOL
I was taking him to visit my mom. Since I don't drive, this required two buses and a streetcar. He was three, and very articulate. We get on the first bus. He looks around at people smiling....getting their attention. Then he sees this really grumpy looking man....and he stares at him. And when the man looks at him, he imitates the guy. The man looks a bit madder, and looks away...but he can't resist and looks back, and my son imitates him again. And people start to snicker. By the time we got off the bus, everyone (well except the one man) was in hysterics laughing.
I took him aside and told him not to be rude.
Next bus. He looks around, all smiley and sweet. Again, getting everyone's attention. Then he points to a man across the aisle and says "look mommy. That man has no hair" I say something like "that's right. Now hush." And the man looks a bit embarrassed, but, it's just a cute little toddler making an observation. And then the cute little toddler shows his horns, and starts getting louder, making sure everyone knows that man has NO hair. DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS? IT MEANS HE'S BALD. YOU KNOW THAT...YOU OVER THERE. CAN YOU SEE HE'S BALD. And people laughed. Of course they did.
And short of smothering him, there is no way to shut this child up.
And finally, we get off that bus. And I tell my son to just please please please stop being so rude. And the street car arrives. And we start walking towards it, and he grabs my hand and starts telling me to run. I refuse and make him slow down, but he keeps pulling at me to hurry hurry hurry. And then he says "we have to get to the door before the fat lady gets stuck in it". And, of course, we are close enough that everyone hears him. And the lady is climbing the steps. And my son yells "EVERYBODY PUSH". And I caught him as he was running towards her. And at that point, I lost it. Again, he had people laughing. He was really on a role.
When we got to my mom's, I walked into the kitchen and said "You wanted a grandson, well here he is. You can keep him."
This one goes back a long time, something like nineteen years ago, but still pretty embarrassing. My girlfriend at the time, let's call her Brandy....Brandy and I were drinking and playing pool with some friends at a local bar, we were all in college at the time. As the night goes on, we all continue to drink....side note, my pool playing seemed to get better in those days the more I drank...not sure if that was perception or reality. Anyway, I make a pretty good run playing 9-ball, and as I'm about to sink the 9 ball in the corner pocket, my girlfriend...who is quite drunk at this point, makes a very deft jump up onto the pool table and straddles the corner pocket. She then looks at me and says something, I don't remember the exact wording but something to the effect of "Sink your big ball into this pocket babe". Now at this point, I had pretty much set up my shot and was mid stroke on the pool cue....yeah I know.....all kinds of innuendo on this one...anyway, I take my eye off the pocket to look at my girlfriend and probably make some off color response....and as I do, I put a little too much bottom English on the 9-ball........the ball rockets upward instead of horizontal and clocks her just under her chin.....hard....She actually half flips, half rolls backward off the pool table striking her head on a chair behind the pool table......Cuts her head open badly enough where it ends up leaving a small scar. Everyone in the bar immediately looks at me like I had just decked her with a solid right hook or something. I immediately start to run around the pool table to check on her, and am intoxicated to the point where I trip over my own feet in my haste to rescue my damsel in distress......I end up on the floor right beside her face first smelling stale cigarette butts and peanut shells. Brandy looks at me and says.............."Nice shot A$$hole".....she was quite the romantic.......lol
...Gost my brother....I need a tissue for the tearss after that one...let me tell one on my dad-since I've never said, done or acted in ANY kind of embarassing way myself(ahem)...the old man was a salesman before he retired-dealing in radio/television advertising...and as such, was in one of his territories(no, his name AIN'T Jack)exiting from a client's building when the urge to umm, pass gas, struck him-and my father is an ace flatulater-he glances about, see's no-one...so he steps beside this column to "take the pressure" off...when he is relieved...he is congratulating himself on not being observed or "cuaght"...when a businesswoman with a disgusted expression departs from the OTHER side of the column...
I was 32 years old when my mother made me want to crawl under the table.
The was a church supper for all the people who were 62 or older. I had my hair long then, and had just spent 70 some dollars on a curl in my hair. It was a lose curl, and I really loved how it looked.
At this dinner, my mother was sitting across from me, and said, 'You need to get that hair cut, it looks awful'.
You know, the next week I went and had it cut off! I couldn't believe my mother could intimidate me at the age of 32!!
i think mine was my sister baked me a cake for my birthday one year. Had it for about a week and no one would eat it. So i tossed it out to our dog at the time. Long story short she won"t eat it either. My sister pulls in, sees the dog throwing something up in the air. She says what that crazy dog doing. I smile and say heck who knows. My daughter speaks up and says Aunt.... she won't eat that nasty cake either,
I've done too much embarrassing stuff to remember. But one I can remember is when I was prolly about 15 or so, my mom took my friend and I to KMart, and my friend and I decided to race across the parking lot. Well, not a bad idea except when I was a teen, I always wore those humongous wide-leg jeans, the ones with the 30-some inch or more leg holes, swishing around my feet like a skirt, not that you could really see my feet as the pants were so big. Needless to say, they tripped me up and I went flying, landing on my knees and hands. I seriously thought for a second I'd been hit by a car, I landed so hard, but my friend was laughing her ass off (mom was too for that matter...) telling me I tripped over my own self. In a brightly-lit, full and busy parking lot. I was embarrassed big time. And had a ouchy on my knee
My sister and I were in Grants.(Somewhat like a k mart)My I had this pack of index cards in my hand and my sister went to grab them. Well I held on tighter and holy crap the band busted and cards went everywhere. Well we were embarrassed and decided to leave. well me got followed out of the store. Yep security. They look at my sister and said you been shop lifting. What they point at her finger and she has on a 99 cent mood ring. She plan on paying for it but we were embarrassed over the cards and left. They laughed and let her just pay for it and the cards too.
There was this once when I was determined to make a change...for the better...so that's what I set out to do. This happened down in Florida...single...I clean up and head out to one of the local ABC Clubs...they have a liquor store (or they did) on one side, a bar and dance floor in another part of the building. Disco hadn't quite passed away...they had one of those strobe-globes hanging above the dance floor...and...the bar was circular and rotated. Yeah...find your seat after a few and your seat has moved on you.
Anyway...I'm not much of a dancer and was even less so at the time. But I was determined to make a showing on the dance floor (I'd seen Stayin' Alive, John Travolta, studied up on his moves...one leg cocked back straight, the other slightly forward and bent at the knee? One arm raised and pointing at the ceiling? The other on the hip. And you kinda jerk? Uh uh uh uh, stayin' alive! stayin' alive!) Hey, if Travolta can do it, I can.
So after about three or four Jack and Cokes, I muster up enough courage to go and ask a girl to dance. I'd watched guys do this...all you gotta do is walk over to them, wait for an opening and make your plea. First girl I asked to dance smiles, nods once, and pushes back in her chair and we head out to the dance floor. I go into my moves. Before the dance if even half over, she has to pee. That's what she tells me, she almost bends over double, smiles shakes her head and says, "I have to pee!"
I stood there as she hustled through the crowd toward the ladies' room. Went back and sat down. Start looking for another recipient of my long-anticipated glee. A shot of courage, and I'm off again. This girl is a repeat of the first, slides back her chair, I follow her out to the dance floor...and I begin to move. I don't think this girl and the first were friends...as they weren't sitting together...but suddenly, she has to pee too! I think she even clutched herself once before she fled toward the ladies' room.
Sometimes, I am clueless. Anyone else? Not to be defeated...I go back to my seat...a bit nervous now...but I finished my drink, order another, and before the bartender brings a fresh drink over, I launch from my seat and head to one of the tables where three pretty ladies are seated. I ask one to dance. Off we go. The strobe lights are fluttering and flashing off everyone...the music is loud...and, I go into my moves. This girl...I dunno...something...she starts laughing and she is shaking her head waving her hands about her face as she hustles off toward the ladies' room.
Discouraged? Oh, you betcha. I take my seat...half-way proud of my courage and a bit chagrined...making three ladies feel the need to pee. Maybe they were in the ladies' room, comparing notes...not that I had a lot of moves. About five minutes later, drinks start appearing in front of me...from the ladies? Oh, no sirree mister. From guys...had one give me a thumbs-up from the other side of the bar...one guy walking past drops his hand on my shoulder and I turn to look at him, but all he did was suppress his laughter and shake his head and walk on. Then...they have this closed-circuit television set-up...a bunch of screens playing above the bar. Some wit was replaying the scene on the television for all to see...me out there with my finger pointed at the ceiling. I make Elaine look good.
I must be the only one who has done shameful things?
There was this once when my roommate Bill, an ER-nurse at Shands Teaching Hospital, and I decided to take a canoe trip down the Suwanee River. So that's what we did...packed a lunch, a few other essentials, and headed up to White City from Gainesville, Florida. There is a canoe rental place there and after doing the paperwork and laying down some cash, the man there carried a canoe down to the river and set it on the shore, Bill and I followed.
As I'm setting an Igloo cooler into the canoe Bill turns to me and says, "I'd thought I'd take the front."
I looked off toward the horizon, thought about it, shrugged, and said, "Yeah, okay."
We'd both been in canoes prior, or that was the claim...so we got settled in and set off. We had a helluva time keeping the canoe pointed down-river and after a time I was silently cursing Bill's ineffectual and woman-like paddling. For each stroke I took from the back, the nose of the canoe would swing around eagerly for the opposite shore.
"Paddle harder!" I tell him...maybe I didn't yell...but I offered up some advice like that.
After a time, a man and a woman w/a young child passed us, we exchanged greetings, and Bill and I admired their paddling ability...especially w/a child in the middle dipping his hand into the water, slowing them down.
We continued to struggle down-river and I tried to steer w/each stroke.
After a time, this group of Norwegian waitresses passed us...dressed for bear. About four or five canoes, two to a canoe, supplies covered with tarps. Maybe they were actually Seal Team Six, infiltrating Cuba. The Norwegian waitresses didn't say a word...they were all business...and they soon put distance between Bill and me. After more time, we passed a group of locals swinging from a rope into a favorite swimming hole and one of them called from the bluff, "Hey, you guys see anyone paddling down the river backwards?" Neither Bill nor I had the energy to reply with more than a mutter and we were both a bit wet from misplaced oars. I questioned Bill's canoe knowledge--he'd sprayed me more than once.
Coming to a bend in the river, we noticed an inviting sandbar and tired as we were, we decided to pull in and rest. As we dropped to the sand and looked at the pretty blue sky, the man from the canoe that had passed us walked over and said, "I don't want to be mindin' ya'll's business...but do you know you're going down the river backwards?"
(Bill had taken the back of the canoe, sat in that seat, facing down-river...and I had sat in the front seat--slightly forward where the real backseat is, and therefore a position of more...leverage...each stroke sent the canoe off on a tangent...)
Okay, surely someone else has a nugget they'd like to share?
This is the one I'm probably the most ashamed about.
Happened on 29 APR 78, The Last Voyage...the day we decommissioned the U.S.S. John S. McCain...and the future senator was attending the event. About a week prior, we had an inspection, dress whites, and after the inspection, I along with three other McCain sailors were chosen to be members of the color guard during the decommissioning ceremony, one other white guy and two black sailors. The ship had been emptied of almost everything and she was going to be towed up to Bremerton, scrapped, and made into razor blades. All of the signal flags were flying from lines from the mast to the fo'c'sle to the fantail, along with the national ensign (that's the red white and blue) from the mast. Ships' crew, all in dress whites, lined the weather-deck on the quay-wall side between piers three and four at the 32nd Street Naval Station in San Diego. The four members of the color guard stood around at the back of the assembling crowd--mostly officers, a lot of gold bars, scrambled eggs (on the brim of their hats), and wives and children...probably about a hundred or better, seated before a podium where speeches would be given.
Some lieutenant j.g...I forget his name...looked us over and selected me from the four, designating me as the carrier of our national ensign, since I was the tallest. The other white guy, a radioman, carried some other flag...I forget which...and the two black sailors carried some kind of rifle. One of them called cadence as we formed a line and "marched" toward the podium, separated into pairs, and took positions on either side of the stage. I'd read John G. Hubbell's, P.O.W. while attending radar school (Oswald was a radar operator, too...oh la)...so I was familiar with the story of John S. McCain, although I had no idea which one of the members of the audience he was...only that he was "retired"...whatever that meant.
We listened to some admiral berate Jimmy Carter for giving away the Panama Canal...there were some other words spoken...and then the color guard "marched" forward, everyone standing...and I wish I could tell you if they were all saluting the national ensign as I carried it past...but as we're making out way up the space between two groupings of standing guests...one guy had this weird look on his face...and the gawd's awful truth is that I've seen that same expression...in these rather unflattering photos of Senator McCain, one where he is squinting (kind of) and holding out one hand, claw-like?
After it was all said and done...as we are beginning to depart, Hopi (that's Petty Officer First Class Hopi...from Ops Division, my division) walks over to me. Hope is built like the proverbial fireplug, he's one pay grade below chief, and chiefs make the world run. But not without men like Hopi. Anyway, Hopi takes me by the arm and asks me in a quiet voice,
"Did you know you can see your tube socks through your uniform?"
"Oh, gee!" I say, looking down at my legs...when they say uniform, they mean exactly that. Uniform means black socks...though one could wear any manner of sock as long as a black sock is the outermost sock. I wore tube socks under my black "silky" socks...anyone remember tube socks? Mine had three bands of red at the top. No wonder that admiral was pizzed at Jimmy Carter...did he say something about future generations? Then Hopi nods, points, doesn't say a word...but he was pointing higher. He handed me my orders to a ship in San Francisco and turned and I never saw him again. I bent my neck to look where Hopi had pointed.
The cream was
you could also see my red bikini underwear through my dress white pants. After boot camp, you could wear whatever underwear you wanted. Heh!
And I will never know if that man cringing in the aisle was a future contender for the presidency...what with all those butterflies in my stomach...but maybe...maybe that was the event that set the course we are on today. Or not. Either way.
Thought this one would be fitting for Veteran's Day. Heh! And #19, to boot!
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