Reindeer Games

Mr. Bach

"If I can't drink

my bowl of coffee three times daily,

then in my torment I will shrivel up

like a piece of roast goat."

J.S. Bach from the Coffee Cantata


Today in the break room, I brought up a question that has been puzzling me for a while.  A popular parlor game/ice breaker is posing the question "If you could meet anyone alive or dead, who would it be?"  However, there are many missing parameters that trouble me.  For instance, if you chose to meet Joan of Arc, would it be necessary to be fluent in Medieval French?  Or what if I was eager to meet Queen Victoria only to find she was scandalized my my loose hair and visable ankles.  Where are am I meeting this person?  What place?  What century?

You see the trouble.

Army Day: The Celebration of Bad Puns

Mom

My mom and her father love puns.  They also play with their hair.  Naturally, my cousins, my sisters and I all play with our hair.  My sisters and cousins also indulge in the pun habit.  For the most part, puns elude me. 

I attribute it to being grounded in reality and far too literal, but I cannot effortlessly find alternative meanings in words.  At gatherings, over plates of brats and Grandpa's legendary potato salad, family would throw puns around like tennis balls.  I would sit quietly and muddle over a word in an attempt to come up with a tortured word play.  But before I could throw mine in the mix, someone else would use my word - only they'd use it better! The celebration of puns, however, is something I partake in with enthusiasm.

Grandpa started it.  On March 4th he and my mom would wish each other a "Happy Army Day!"  Do you get it?  March 4 = march forth = Army Day (I warned you it was bad).  After my mom moved out, she and Grandpa would call each other on March 4.  It became a joke between them to see who could call whom first.  When I was little, I thought March 4 was a nationally recognized holiday.  Obviously, one of the hazards benefits of homeschooling is growing up with your own holidays.