Stand up

I'm a little bored with writing about the drive to Florida (because I can't remember that long ago) so I thought I'd post a copy of the stand up routine I did for the retreat we had in May (which was longer ago than the Florida trip so not writing about the trip because it was so long ago really makes no sense whatsoever).

Ahem...

That whole thing got started in a really weird way. I called and left a message on someone's answering machine stating that Mom would be able to keep the kids so I was planning on attending to do my stand up routine ("Ha ha ha, hardy har har and all that I'll see you Sunday."). The whole thing was supposed to be a joke. I might have mentioned something about olives too but this was way back at the end of April so I can't be sure about that part. Ask Phyllis.

The day after I left this silly message, there was a meeting about the retreat. We went over the schedule, who was doing what, when, who was bringing what, when, who needed a ride, etc. In the schedule there was a ten minute "surprise". I thought that was funny until I got busted on the way out to the car. Guess who the surprise was? That made me laugh for some reason.

When I got home, I told Mike that I was supposed to do a comedy act and that he couldn't tell anyone because it was supposed to be a surprise. He laughed. I mean full out laughing, red face, tears, everything. Why am I so darn funny to my husband? I hadn't even said anything, just that I was scared I might not be funny. For all I knew they were setting me up just so they could warm up their pitching arms for the upcoming softball season.

Actually, what I said was, "You're just laughing because you can't go to the women's retreat and you are worried about what I might say about you." Then he laughed harder! What?

Here's the transcript. I should have done this awhile ago because I digressed from my written script quite a bit and it was so long ago, I don't remember exactly how it really went. Thankfully, there isn't any video evidence of this on youtube as far as I know. Also, I committed two errors of public speaking 1) I lost my composure which later was pretty funny to me and 2) I jammed my hands into my pockets. At least I didn't have any loose change to rattle around. Oh. I also didn't walk around quite enough to keep people's attention. A good speaker knows not to stand still in front of the podium. I did this because "good speaker" are the operative words in that sentence and I do not resemble a good speaker by any stretch of the imagination. If you were at the retreat, you will recognize that the statement "I am not a public speaker" has to be the understatement of the year.

The theme of the retreat was "Overcoming Obstacles" so I presented a slightly different way of looking at situations that we sometimes view as obstacles.

Without further adieu (am I French all of the sudden?):

"The last time I stood in front of a group of people to speak, I was doing a demonstration speech at the University of Toledo on the esoteric and ever important topic of how to oil the valves of my trumpet. I am fairly certain I saw various people fall asleep when I announced what I was doing. At the very least, some of their eyes glazed over until I had the valves back in my horn and proceeded to blast out a perfectly in tune B(flat), much to the dismay of the slacker sleepers in the class. At any rate, let's hope this turns out to be more exciting than that fiasco.

Did you know that the word laugh is in the Bible at least three times? Here's two: Proverbs 1:26 states that "I will laugh at your calamity." I figure if God is laughing at my calamity, then maybe I should be laughing at it too, instead of worrying about it. For example, remember that commercial from a few years ago? I think it was Doritos and the tag line was "Go ahead, we'll make more." Well, Mike called the other day to say something had gone wrong with the truck. I said, "Mike, money is like a bag of Doritos, we'll make more." Instead of getting all stressed out about even more costly repairs to the truck, he was laughing when he hung up the phone.

The second verse is Luke 6:21. It states "Blessed are you that hunger now for you shall be filled. Blessed are you that weep for now you shall laugh."

Most of you don't know me very well other than perhaps, as that crazy woman who has eight kids and sits in the front of the church. We are the Deffely family. Or, as I sometimes affectionately refer to us as "Legion", for we are many (cue the rim shot here). Hopefully, when I'm done you will have a little more insight into the strange way my mind works. I'm pretty sure that if nothing else, in the end, you will have a lot more sympathy for Mike who has been charged with the task of living with me.

I cordially invite you to accompany me on a trip through my wild and wacky world.

Oh...and further along, we'll understand it all by and by.

"The Lighter Side of Obstacles"
subtitled: "Are they really obstacles or is it just our perception?"

Sometimes our family can be an obstacle.

One of my sister's friends asked Corinne if I was as silly as Val. Corinne said, "Well, my mom and Aunt Val drive my grandma crazy." Not to be outdone, my niece said, "And grandma drives them crazy."

A quote from my nephew directed towards his little brother: "I didn't even call you a bad name like idiot. You snot."

Grandma and Grandpa had a Sunday School class party to go to so they arranged for a babysitter to come and stay with my Dad and his four siblings. The kids didn't like the babysitter and thought they were old enough to stay home without one. They wanted her to leave. My grandparents had the ashes of some dead relative stored at their house. So, my Dad got the box of ashes out, told the babysitter it was Uncle So and So and proceeded to chase the babysitter out of the house. Dad chased her all around their yard while she screamed hysterically, until she finally just ran home. Surprisingly, she never babysat for my Dad, aunts and uncle again. I can only assume it was the last time grandma and grandpa got to go anywhere without their kids for a very long time.

Sometimes there are physical obstacles
My nephew went to the doctor for his physical. After getting one of his booster shots he said, "That shot didn't hurt at all. Last time I got a shot it felt like they were poking me with a needle."

My five year old nephew told his brother that he would be needing a chicken pox vaccine when he went to the doctor the next time. He reasoned that this was necessary because they had been playing with the chickens a lot.

I was talking to my friend about some silly things when I stated that most people think I'm younger than I really am. I also told her that I've never had the guts to ask someone if they think that because of how I look or if it's because of the way I act.

I got a really good "2 for" deal the other day. The nice lady at JCPenney gave me two eyebrows where once there was only one.

Bethany told my sister, "Once I ate seven bowls of cereal. The next day my tummy was so flat, I ate eleven bowls."

Sometimes our political views can be an obstacle
Bethany and I were having a conversation about the upcoming election last Fall. She said, "If I were 30 I would vote for McCain." I asked her who she would vote for if she were 18 and she promptly told me, "I would still vote for McCain even if I were 18 or 30 or even if I were GRANDMA'S age!"

My seven year old nephew said to his brother, "You want Obama or that other guy to win?" To which his five year old brother responded, "Who? Joe the Plumber?"

Sometimes our finances can be an obstacle
I received this email a couple of weeks ago:
Letter to the Bank
Dear Sirs:
One of my checks was marked insufficient funds. In view of the current events in the banking industry, does that refer to me or you?

Sometime we just don't know what the obstacle is.
I overheard a conversation at my Dad's office last week in which two people were talking about their fingernails. One of them said her nails were not balanced. She said, "Just look at them! I just had them done and they look awful. I had another tech look at them and she said the balance would have to be completely redone." As I was typing my report, I glanced down at my own fingernails and realized they had never been balanced to my knowledge and not only that, but I had no idea what "balanced fingernails" even meant. I wondered if I should be concerned about this fact. Should I worry about my nails balanced or otherwise? This was quickly followed by this thought: "I do too know what having balanced nails means. It means that I have carefully and painstakingly chewed them all off to a uniform length." Problem solved.

At the Toledo Zoo there are two vultures whom Bethany loves. She likes to stop and watch them for a long time when we visit the zoo. One day we were there while they were eating. Most people hurried on their way when they figured out it was lunchtime for the vultures. Everyone, except us. One of the vultures was strutting around when Bethany piped up with, "You big, beautiful bird! Your beak is such a pretty blue color." Apparently, Bethany did not notice the rabbit entrails hanging out of either side of the vulture's beautiful, blue beak.

Sometimes our speech or what we read can be an obstacle.
A couple of summers ago, we travelled to Gatlinburg, TN. The area around Jellico has some very steep mountains and we talked about them while we were driving through the area. A couple of weeks later, we were listening to one of the kid's CDs in the van and I heard Bethany singing about Joshua and the Battle of Jellico.

Bethany told my mom that Christ aroast on Easter Sunday.

Last week we were listening to one of the kid's CDs in the van on the way home from church. I heard Bethany singing and I said, "You know that's Joshua fit the battle of Jericho, right?" I heard her quietly say, "I don't care if it is Jericho. I already know that. I'm going to sing Jerica because I like that word better."

I was online looking for some new sandals the other day when I ran across a description that read, "When you put these gladiator sandals on, they will make you feel Roman." I really wondered about that. If you buy them, do they make you want to beat people or what?

In keeping with the sandal theme: Are the words "strappy sandals" an oxymoron? Aren't sandals, by definition, strappy?

My sister sent me a small advertisement awhile back. It read, "Fresh items are not available in all stores." What? I gotta tell you that I hope I'm shopping in the store where the fresh stuff is.

Did you hear about the one-armed man who applauded the kindness of strangers?

How about the guy who went into the sheriff's department to find out how to legally kill someone?

This is pretty funny too: The police found an open door in the back of an old warehouse. An officer went inside and called out "Marco". They found the suspect they were looking for when he responded "Polo".

Pierre
Once upon a time our parents took my sisters and I to Washington D.C. in a 12 passenger van. It had a unit that slid into the back after the seats were removed from the van. The unit had U-shaped seating with a table in the middle which could be removed and made into a bed. Mom and Dad were up front and my sisters and I were in the back of the van. Soon enough, cars were passing Dad with drivers honking their horns and waving. Other drivers were passing him and giving him funny looks which must have prompted him to ask us what we were doing. Our response was to innocently shrug our shoulders and say, "Nothing. Just sitting here." What Dad didn't know was this: On the bottom of my sister's foot, we had drawn Pierre. Pierre was a nice little character with a cute little nose, eyes, mouth and five strands of hair, I mean toes. The cup holder from the seating unit was Pierre's top hat. When cars drove past us, my sister would lay down so only Pierre was visible in the window. He had a notebook with a variety of instructions for other drivers on the Pennsylvania Pike such as: "Honk! If you are bored, tired, having fun, going to Hershey Park, going to Gettysburg, D.C., etc." Pierre also had other communications such as, "Wave if you are driving a blue car, red car, truck, etc." Some people seemed to have trouble with this one because we would hold up the blue sign and the driver of a red car would honk which of course would send us into peals of laughter "Dingbat! Don't you know what color your car is? Your car is blue! We said honk if your car is red!" Sometimes Pierre was bored on this long trip. That's when he got out the sign that read, "HELP! I AM BEING HELD HOSTAGE!" or "HELP! I AM BEING KIDNAPPED!" I guess those must have been the signs we were holding up when Dad was getting the weird looks from the other drivers. Needless to say, I wouldn't recommend trying that stunt in today's society.

I'll leave you with a couple of final thoughts:
My Grandma always told us, "Laugh and the world laughs with you. Weep and you weep alone." My Uncle Bob always said, "Small minds amuse easily." So which is it? For most of my life I've tried to figure out if I should be walking around laughing instead of weeping alone or if I do, am I admitting that I have a small mind? I'm sure the answer to that question is apparent to most of you by now.

The final "laugh" scripture is Ecclesiastes 3:4. It says, "A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance." Hopefully, I haven't made anyone cry today and I bet you're really hoping that next year no one asks me to dance.

I hope you have enjoyed this time of looking at the obstacles we encounter, in a little bit different and slightly warped light.