Exchanges with People that Make Your Brain Hurt

[ica171]

This morning I got a call from my kids' pediatrician's office. For BG, I have three kids: two boys who are 8 and 6 and an almost 11-month-old daughter. The last time the boys were there was in September for their yearly physical; DD was there in October for her nine month checkup.

The nurse on the line said, "Hi, I was just calling to check on YDS. How is he feeling?" I was confused, but told her he was fine. She asked if he still had a sore throat. I said no. I think at this point she was confused, too, because she asked if he had been to the ER recently. I told her no, it's been years since he's been to the ER (once when he was in pre-K; now he's in first grade). She gave me the name of the ER and the date, which was two days ago. I confirmed that he had not been there. She said "OK, so he's feeling better now?" I probably should have asked her to verify his middle name or something because obviously this was not my son she was talking about, but I just said yes. She thanked me and told me to have a good day.

I posted earlier in the thread about a doctor's office calling me to verify an appointment I hadn't made, which I put off to having a common name. I'm assuming that's the case here as YDS also has a pretty common name, although I hope it was just the nurse calling the wrong patient and not that the ER put the visit under the wrong name. I'd rather not have to deal with getting bills for this ER visit because someone picked the wrong name out of the computer.

I called this afternoon because I realized I hadn't made an appointment for my daughter's one year checkup yet. I asked about it and the receptionist promised to have a nurse call me back. She did, but my phone didn't ring so she left a voicemail where she said there was nothing in YDS's file that would indicate I should have been called. So I'm assuming it's what I thought, that whoever made the call just clicked on the wrong name. The woman who called apologized profusely probably half a dozen times in a two or three minute message; it makes me wonder what they have to deal with on a day to day basis.

[Ida]

A friend of mine bought a used car with a "Jesus" fish.  She's Jewish ...

Well, so was Jesus.


Back in the day, I had a Datsun 510 that I pretty much covered with bumper stickers because it was such a predigested-looking color. I had to make a few myself, including the one in Farsi and the one that said "This Car Climbed Mount Mazama." That one was a great geek-filter.

It all caused a couple of brain hurts, though, because Once Upon A Time in Berkeley we had a great hippie cab company, Taxi Unlimited, whose cabs were painted all kinds of ways: early artcars, I guess.  At least twice when I was waiting to pick up DH at a BART station, people gave me conniptions by just getting into the car uninvited because they thought I was TU.

Ah well, I was younger than and my blood pressure was more resilient. And I did learn to leave the passenger door locked and the window opened just a bit so I could holler through it.

[lilfox]

Last month, I had a conversation with a new coworker that was a bit odd.  We were chatting about our kids, and after telling me about how great a mother she is (she literally used that expression) to her sons, we got to talking about my daughter.  She asked if I would ever allow my daughter to date.  I said, um, sure, when she's old enough, like 15 or so.  Coworker was aghast!  See, in her culture, girls don't date, they get married.  In order to even consider being allowed to see a boy, she said girls basically have to be "pre-engaged" to him but regular dating?  Especially casual dating?  Nope, doesn't happen.

It was her reaction that was brain-hurty:  She seemed by turns fascinated and horrified that I thought it would be acceptable to let my daughter go on dates (eventually, years from now).  She's lived in the US for at least a decade though, and I'm guessing has been exposed to enough of our pop culture to know that dating is common here, starting in high (or even junior high) school and continuing, well, indefinitely in some cases, but certainly preceding marriage in most cases.

[Irishkitty]

The glasses/contacts thing reminded me of this. When I was 16, I switched from glasses (which I had worn most of my life) to contacts. For the next couple of weeks I kept getting variations of this comment. "You look different. Did you get your hair cut?"

This reminds me of when I left school. I switched from glasses to contact lenses over the summer. When I arrived at the School at the end of the summer for the Debs (equivalent of High School Senior Prom) many people didn't recognise me AT ALL, and one girl (it was an all-girls school) was convinced I was an imposter pretending to be me!

[Virg]

LazyDaisy wrote:

"They probably both thought that since Natasha obviously doesn't mind the contact that the order just doesn't "count" anymore. But if she gets mad at him again, then it does 'cause that's how it works right?"

I'm willing to bet a dollar that he didn't think it through even that far.

Virg

[Shalamar]

lilfox, your story reminds me of a friend of mine who stated when her son was born that she wouldn't allow him to date until he was 18.  18 years later, she still has that attitude.  My thoughts?  "If you honestly think you can pull that off, more power to you.  But kids - especially teenagers - are a lot more creative about getting around their parents' rules than you may like to believe."

(Personally, I thought that "18" was way too strict, but that's just my opinion.)

[Yvaine]

The glasses/contacts thing reminded me of this. When I was 16, I switched from glasses (which I had worn most of my life) to contacts. For the next couple of weeks I kept getting variations of this comment. "You look different. Did you get your hair cut?"

This reminds me of when I left school. I switched from glasses to contact lenses over the summer. When I arrived at the School at the end of the summer for the Debs (equivalent of High School Senior Prom) many people didn't recognise me AT ALL, and one girl (it was an all-girls school) was convinced I was an imposter pretending to be me!

I've learned by many years' experience that I'm unrecognizable to many people if they've only ever known me with my hair up and suddenly I wear it down. It's long and not well-behaved, so in most work situations it's tightly corralled into submission. I've had multiple co-workers fail to recognize me if I did let The Mop loose in their presence.

[RebeccainGA]

The glasses/contacts thing reminded me of this. When I was 16, I switched from glasses (which I had worn most of my life) to contacts. For the next couple of weeks I kept getting variations of this comment. "You look different. Did you get your hair cut?"

This reminds me of when I left school. I switched from glasses to contact lenses over the summer. When I arrived at the School at the end of the summer for the Debs (equivalent of High School Senior Prom) many people didn't recognise me AT ALL, and one girl (it was an all-girls school) was convinced I was an imposter pretending to be me!

I've learned by many years' experience that I'm unrecognizable to many people if they've only ever known me with my hair up and suddenly I wear it down. It's long and not well-behaved, so in most work situations it's tightly corralled into submission. I've had multiple co-workers fail to recognize me if I did let The Mop loose in their presence.

Me too! hair down + glasses made my boss of 4 years have to do a double take to recognize me!

[KenveeB]

The glasses/contacts thing reminded me of this. When I was 16, I switched from glasses (which I had worn most of my life) to contacts. For the next couple of weeks I kept getting variations of this comment. "You look different. Did you get your hair cut?"

This reminds me of when I left school. I switched from glasses to contact lenses over the summer. When I arrived at the School at the end of the summer for the Debs (equivalent of High School Senior Prom) many people didn't recognise me AT ALL, and one girl (it was an all-girls school) was convinced I was an imposter pretending to be me!

Hey, it works for Clark Kent.

[Piratelvr1121]

When I forget a password and have to reset it, which means a laundry list of requirements topped off with a partridge in a pair tree, and including "Cannot be the same password as you've had for the last year."

Um, if I could remember I wouldn't be resetting my password, here.

[mmswm]

The glasses/contacts thing reminded me of this. When I was 16, I switched from glasses (which I had worn most of my life) to contacts. For the next couple of weeks I kept getting variations of this comment. "You look different. Did you get your hair cut?"

This reminds me of when I left school. I switched from glasses to contact lenses over the summer. When I arrived at the School at the end of the summer for the Debs (equivalent of High School Senior Prom) many people didn't recognise me AT ALL, and one girl (it was an all-girls school) was convinced I was an imposter pretending to be me!

I've learned by many years' experience that I'm unrecognizable to many people if they've only ever known me with my hair up and suddenly I wear it down. It's long and not well-behaved, so in most work situations it's tightly corralled into submission. I've had multiple co-workers fail to recognize me if I did let The Mop loose in their presence.

I had the security guard at work question me the one and only time I wore my waist-length hair down.  It was rather amusing.

[nutraxfornerves]

The Darwin fish post reminded me of this (details fudged, name invented):

I have a relative who lives far away from me. We aren't particularly close (she's a perfectly nice person, but we have little in common), but since she's an avid user of Facebook, I'm always seeing what she's up to. 

However, my jaw dropped when she wrote that she was running around getting ready to host a LGBT party for her teenager. You see, she and her whole family are an active and devout members of a faith that considers homosexuality a sin. She would never publicly say or do anything remotely homophobic, but I am pretty sure that she would not knowingly socialize with g@y people in her own home, nor would she permit her children to do so. She also lives in a community where most residents share her faith. If any of her children are g@y, they would be deeply closeted.

So I was very, very puzzled.

Before asking her or another relative who knows her better, I did a bit of Googling. It turned out to be a end of-the-year party for the Lobo Grande Baton Twirlers.

[joraemi]

The Darwin fish post reminded me of this (details fudged, name invented):

I have a relative who lives far away from me. We aren't particularly close (she's a perfectly nice person, but we have little in common), but since she's an avid user of Facebook, I'm always seeing what she's up to. 

However, my jar dropped when she wrote that she was running around getting ready to host a LGBT party for her teenager. You see, she and her whole family are an active and devout members of a faith that considers homosexuality a sin. She would never publicly say or do anything remotely homophobic, but I am pretty sure that she would not knowingly socialize with g@y people in her own home, nor would she permit her children to do so. She also lives in a community where most residents share her faith. If any of her children are g@y, they would be deeply closeted.

So I was very, very puzzled.

Before asking her or another relative who knows her better, I did a bit of Googling. It turned out to be a end of-the-year party for the Lobo Grande Baton Twirlers.

Thank goodness I wasn't drinking anything when I read that!

[NyaChan]

LOLOL   

[gramma dishes]

Honestly though, if you think about it, Lobo Grande Baton Twirlers would be a perfect pseudo name for an underground LGBT group!!