Michelle Smiles

Teaching my children to question authority, except mine.

Hint: See if it bounces

June30

choking-safety-fail

posted under humor | 6 Comments »

No chicken for you! Come back 1 year.

April16

After getting my hair cut, I didn’t want to cook.  At Steve’s request, I went to pick up some dinner at KFC.  KFC doesn’t provide a plethora of choices.  You’ve got chicken in a couple of forms and some side dishes.  No burgers.  No fish.  No turkey clubs.  Just chicken.

I pull into the drive thru and find the man in the car in front of me engaged in conversation with an employee through the intercom.  I’ve learned to dial back my impatience a little bit here in the south.  People here like to have conversations in situations in which northerners would cut you for making small talk.  But there are limits.

Man: I’ve been wanting to try that new grilled kind. Is it good?

Employee: Most people seem to like it.

Man: If I didn’t get the grilled, what are your other kinds?

Employee: Regular and crispy.

Man: What is the difference?  Is the regular crispy at all?  Because my wife likes it pretty crispy.

Employee: It is a bit crispy but if she likes it crispy, you  might want to order the crispy.

Man: I have some coupons at home.  How much would I save with them?

Employee: I’m not sure sir – depends on the coupons.

Man: Should I go home and get them? We just live down the road a bit. We’ve never been to this KFC before even though we are just down the road.  Oh probably only 2 miles or so.

Employee: If you want to go get the coupons, we can get you fixed up when you come back.  (I must say, this young man had great patience.  I could tell he was trying to hurry him along but he was never less than courteous.)

Man: Well, I just don’t know.  And I’m not sure how many pieces to get.  What do you think?

Employee: How many people are you feeding?

Man: 4 I think.  Unless Bobby has a friend over. I think the 16 piece would be too much but the 12 piece might not be enough.

Employee: We have a special on the 7 piece for $9.99.  You could get 2 of those.

Man: But then again if Bobby’s friend is there…

At this point, to avoid ramming my car into him, I drove around and went inside.  I ordered, paid, and waited for our food.  As the girl was handing me my order, the kid from the drive thru window came over and asked if I had been behind that gentleman.  I laughed and said I had.  He apologized profusely and I told him I thought he did a great job of dealing with him.  He said he had JUST gotten him to pull ahead.

Memo #462

Dear Sir:
You are too stupid to order chicken.  Go home.

Sincerely,

A woman who really wanted some mashed potatoes

LOL Cats

April16

funny-pictures-cat-and-human-argue

I have a memo to write because some people are too stupid to have chicken but until then I share this because it made me laugh out loud.  Also, if you need another laugh, go visit this video post Are Preschoolers Unfit Mothers? I rarely watch video on blogs but this is worth it.

See more LOL cats here.

posted under humor | 6 Comments »

Not an April Fools post

April1

gateway_pacific_blue_laptopSteve surprised me with a new (refurbished) laptop about a month ago.  (It is blue and pretty.  And I will love him and pet him and I will name him George.)  (If you don’t get the Bugs Bunny reference you are too young to read my blog.)  My 4 year old laptop had been throwing the blue screen of death around for about 6 months and we weren’t sure how many more times we could revive her.  The new one was “too good a deal to pass up” according to my geek husband.  (You need to keep in mind that he is a software engineer and is wicked smart about all things computer.)

Saturday there was a huge storm.  Tornadoes flying about.  Wind whipping lawn furniture around.  The power went on and off a few times.  Skies an eerie color that make you wish you had a basement.  The world is ending kind of thing.  After it passed, I tried to turn on my laptop. Nothing.  Steve tried.  Nothing.  Neither of us could believe that the 5 week old laptop had been zapped by the storm.  (No surge protector. Stupid, I know.)

Steve calls customer service hoping maybe they wouldn’t ask questions and that “It’s dead” might be sufficient to invoke the warranty on the refurb.  Steve rolls his eyes as they ask him to walk through the basic manual steps to revive it.  (He mocks these kind of customer service people because they are reading from manual and generally know much less than he does.  But he is nice to them and plays along.)  You know…the “sir did you reboot it?” variety.  After he walked through a few steps with them, to Steve’s astonishment, the laptop booted up.

He realized that the plug jack in the back is loose.  It wasn’t making a good connection on Saturday and the battery got drained so it was dead.  Because of the storm we just made the assumption that it was zapped without really investigating.  Heh. I can now harrass my geek hubby with “Sir is it plugged in?” jokes.

There is a little bit of joy when my genius hubby has blonde moments too.

posted under humor | 12 Comments »

Memo #3621

March21

milkMemo to the 9:15 breakfast patrons at Cracker Barrel:

My apologies for disturbing your breakfast.  I just wanted someone else to make breakfast today.  We wouldn’t have come if we had realized the baby would be fussy the whole time.

I swear I never return my food but in the middle of my pancakes was a sea of batter with bobbing blueberries.  There was a brief huddle around our table because apparently the waitress needed the manager to confirm that they were in fact not supposed to be liquid filled.  And I really wanted the pancakes but waiting for another order pushed the kids over the edge.

And that is the first time my 2 year old has ever dumped her milk on the floor.  Really.

We promise not to bother you again in the foreseeable future.  We don’t plan on going out much until we stop being the family that acts as birth control for the childless and prompts those with children to be thankful they are past this stage.

Sincerely,

The woman who ran before the milk cup stopped rolling under the table

posted under humor | 10 Comments »

Ash Wednesday

February25

Alternative title: Further proof that I am an idiot.

Setting: Jefferson Hall cafeteria, Ash Wednesday 1991, with my peeps from the 4th floor. We all sit down with our trays of food.

Me: Um, Lisa?  You have some schmutz on your forehead.

Lisa: Silence waiting for me to laugh at my own joke.

Jen (who happens to be Jewish): You moron.  It’s Ash Wednesday.

Me: Wha?

Once Lisa stopped laughing she explained it to me.  18 years later I still feel like an idiot and laugh at myself every Ash Wednesday.  Hi Lisa, where ever you are!

ashweds I’m obviously not Catholic but I did grow up going to church.  I even went to confirmation camp for a week so that I could bond with my confirmation class and memorize all of the relevant stuff I needed to know to be confirmed as a member of the church.  But we United Church of Christ goers are apparently pretty liberal and far left from the Catholics because I had made it 19 years never hearing of having ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday.  Even my Jewish pal knew about it.  Yep, I do my momma proud.

posted under humor | 13 Comments »

Happy Valentines Day

February14

peggyvalentine

Best Valentines Day card I’ve seen in ages!

Stolen from Ellie on Facebook who stole it from someone and so on and so on.

Happy Valentines Day!

posted under humor | 14 Comments »

HA!

January23

I rarely get truly funny email jokes any more but this cracked me up.  Rather than sending it to all of you, I am posting it here.

Why parents should always check their children’s homework before they hand it in:

A first grade girl handed in the drawing below for a homework assignment.

homework

After it was graded and the child brought it home, she returned to school the next day with the following note:
Dear Ms. Davis,
I want to be very clear on my child’s illustration. It is NOT of me on a dance pole on a stage in a strip joint. I work at Home Depot and had commented to my daughter how much money we made in the recent snowstorm. This photo is of me selling a shovel.
Mrs. Harrington

posted under humor | 14 Comments »

Bilibo

January8

Sabrina decided that since I wouldn’t make her toasted cheese for breakfast, she would make her own.

dsc08277

Aunt Lulu and Uncle Pat gave Sabrina this ambiguous/imaginative toy for Christmas.  It makes no noise, requires no batteries, and defies definition so it can truly be whatever the child wants it to be.  Today it was a pan to cook toasted cheese.  Many days it is a chair.  Sometimes it holds puzzle pieces.  It is pretty cool…it even sparks mommy’s imagination.

dsc08282

I’ll leave it to you.  Am I a Fry Guy?

mcdonaldcharacters

A lost cast member from Space Balls?

spaceballs2

Or Mush Mouth’s sister?

dumb_donald

Or as Gibb suggested, a scrubbing bubble?

dow

Maybe I’ve gone too long without adult contact? Sabrina has had a cold so we’ve opted out of all activities this week.

posted under humor | 14 Comments »

Memo #20091

January6

starbucks_cup

Dear Fellow Starbucks Customer:

Thank you.  You reminded me that the warm, fuzzy glow of the holidays has been washed away by days on end of rain.

You saw me walking into Starbucks with an infant in one arm and my wallet in the other hand.  You then speed walked to beat me to the counter so that you and your 4 children, who each required her own specialty order of hot cocoa,  wouldn’t have to wait.  You could have spent the time it took for them to make my solitary latte discussing exactly what each child wanted to order so that I wouldn’t have to stand behind you through the Great Whipped Cream or No Whipped Cream Debate of 2009 – just a suggestion.  I had the joy of juggling a squirming, increasingly irritated infant while waiting for the Starbucks trainee to figure out how to make each of the 4 different hot cocoas and your complicated macchiato (what the hell is a macchiato anyway?).  Thank you for giving me that extra 15 minutes (I think this particular trainee might not make it through barista college) of strength training for my left arm and face time with my angry infant.

I hope your kids all spilled sticky, sugary, pepperminty, whipped cream covered cocoa in your mini van.

Signed,

The under-caffeinated momma with the over developed left arm

posted under humor | 19 Comments »
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