It Gets Worse

I know that we all say stupid things... some of us more often than others... but it's worse for fair-skinned people like me who blush. Darker skinned people can say something embarrassing and quickly change the subject or move on and no one knows any better. Sometimes the audience doesn't even notice something stupid was said because there wasn't a glowing face and beet-red ears staring back at them.

It happened to me today. I was substitute teaching our Gospel Doctrine class at church. It's been about a year since I've had the calling in a different ward so I was more nervous than usual. Near the beginning of the lesson the principle of humility came up. I decided to share a story from my mission about how the proselyting success rate skyrocketed in the poor areas of England, most likely due to the fact they had been sufficiently humbled and were spiritually prepared to hear about our church.

For some unknown reason, however, I got off on a bizarre tangent about the English economy and government. I asked several rhetorical questions about how their economy could even sustain itself due to the government hand-outs including free money and free houses.

I brought myself back to the lesson fairly quickly and started to continue with my analogy when I saw a raised hand near the front of the classroom. It was a 60ish year old lady that I had never seen before and it looked like she wasn't sure if she should even be raising her hand. I pointed to her and asked if she had a comment. She said, "Yes, I have a comment..." and unfortunately those words were spoken with a genuine British accent. I audibly and probably visibly gulped as she started to defend the system of government in England while her British husband stared at me with a fake, forced smile on his face. I could feel my face getting red and I almost wondered aloud "Who turned off the freakin' air conditioning?" You know how in movies when people get nervous they put their index finger between their neck and their shirt collar to try to get a bit of air flow to their sopping wet chest? That was me. I'm pretty sure I did that a few times while she was defending her country.

Seriously, though... what are the chances that the one day I say something rude about England is the day we have two English visitors? Man, I felt like an idiot.

After she finished talking about England and my pit stains had grown to the decorative size of medium cantaloupes, I said something like, "Really? It appears I was grossly misinformed for 2 full years." Then I moved on to the next topic.

This experience wasn't as bad as the one that happened about 10 years ago. I was working security at the Delta Center and I was hanging out in the ticket lobby trying to look authoritative and important as a 21 year old security guru. I wandered over to the receptionist desk and I noticed two really hot chicks sitting in chairs against the wall filling out applications. I stood a few yards away for about 30 seconds waiting for them to look up and notice my appealing muscle mass and average stature. When they didn't look up, I went out on a limb and said, "How are you ladies doing?" Neither one of them looked up. They continued studying their applications. Then the receptionist said, "They don't speak English".
I asked the receptionist where they were from and she said, "They're from Russia or Brazil or something." Then I said, "That's too bad cause I had four years of German in High School and I remember some key phrases that might help me communicate if they were German."

The receptionist asked what phrases I could remember and I said, "Well my favorite one is 'Ich habe durchfall'". At this point, both of the smokin' hotties looked up at me and started laughing their respective heads off. Apparently they WERE German and had just heard me say that I had diarrhea. It didn't do me any good to try to explain to them that my poo's were actually not at all runny.

I walked away pretty red-faced, but then I couldn't help but laugh at myself when I pictured, in it's entirety, what they had heard. Some dude in a uniform walks up to them and says, "Blah blah blah, blah?". Then the receptionist says, "Blah blah blah." I say, "Blah blah blah?" to which she replies, "Blah blah blah blah." Then I decide to say, "Blah blah Blah I HAVE DIARRHEA."

I'd be laughing, as well.