I shot him a glance and said, "What are you thinking?" He insisted that he had had it before, and he loves Prime Rib.
No problem, we have a gift certificate; if he likes it, we can splurge.
The look on his face was priceless when they put the Prime Rib in front of him, and he realized that he was not going to be chowing down on BBQ ribs---which he had had before and he does love.
After CCD this week, Cheryl and Grace were discussing Martin Luther’s exodus from the Catholic Church. Cheryl was explaining his reasoning, and Grace became a bit disturbed and expressed her displeasure with Martin Luther King!
Wait a second, wrong guy, wrong century!
Then there was Noah. He and Matthew were playing football in the front yard, and Matthew came in to use the bathroom. Noah followed, but he was crying. Cheryl asked him what the heck had happened. Noah reported that Matthew had held him in the thorny rose bush before he snapped the ball, and had run off leaving him in the thorny rose bush.
As Matthew exited the bathroom, he was confronted by his over-protective mother expecting an apology. Matthew was surprised, and as he struggled to figure out what had happened, Noah chimed in with... "Well... about that..."
Apparently, he just lost, and the whole thorny rose bush thing was all just a little misunderstanding!
But the all-time misunderstanding in the family occurred several years ago. When Matthew was about 4 years old, we had a Christmas party at our house. At the time, he was not feeling well, and in the middle of the party, he laid on the floor and fell asleep in the middle of a room filled with people. He was very sick.
The next day, we had to go to Christmas dinners at Cheryl’s mom’s house and at my mom’s house. We decided that Cheryl would take Matthew to Nighttime Pediatrics while I started the dinner tour at Cheryl’s mom’s. After about an hour, I received a beep on my Nextel---we each had a “walkie talkie” Nextel phone at the time. Cheryl advised that the doctor said we had a very sick boy, and he had to be quarantined for forty-five days.
Forty-five days!!!! What does he have?
Cheryl calmly advised that he had pneumonia.
You don’t get quarantined for forty-five days for pneumonia. I want you to go back to the doctor, and see if he uses the words "pneumonia" and "quarantined" in the same sentence again, and if he does, bring Matthew home and I will take him to the hospital!!! Thats tuberculosis, not pneumonia!!!
She called back, and again, she calmly explained that the doctor had confirmed his diagnosis, and Cheryl wondered what was my problem.
In front of her entire family, I not-so-calmly explained that there was no way that this doctor knows what he is talking about, and there is no way that we can keep him quarantined for forty-five days. I had everyone appropriately concerned.
I left Cheryl’s mom’s house and went over to my mom’s house, and I went straight to my sister-in-law Pam. She has no formal medical training, but she did raise seven kids and knows everything there is to know to about sick kids. I asked her if she had ever heard of a kid being quarantined for forty-five days for pneumonia?
She looked at me and smiled and said, "Four to five days."
"No," I insisted, "she said forty-five---I asked her twice."
Pam now was in a full out laugh and said, "No, she did not!"
"Oh yes she did, and I will call her and I will prove it."
So I called Cheryl again on our new Nextels and asked her specifically did she say forty-five or four to five.
Lets just say there was a little misunderstanding that had every family member at Cheryl’s mother’s party, and every family member at my mother’s party in a good holiday mood---except me.
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