Oooop!  Did I Really Do/Say That?

Have you ever done or said something that you wished you hadn't?  I'm sure it's a universal condition.  I'm not talking about mean or vengeful stuff that you later wish you had not said or done.  I'm talking about real "foot in the mouth", hang your head in embarrassment, "I can't believe I actually said or did that" kind of stuff.  Two very glaring examples come to mind at this time.  I know there are more, but these two, to me, remain as priceless.

To preface these situations, I want everyone to know that though I fool around a lot presenting a curmudgeonly character, I truly try hard to treat everyone with respect and don't wish to hurt any feelings.  I know, it's hard to believe, but it is the honest truth.

The Boy Friend and the Pork Chop
The first happened some years back when my youngest sister-in-law was visiting home from out of town with her boy friend who would later become her husband.  We had heard a lot about this guy and we made plans to have them over for dinner.  I decided to make my latest and greatest version of pork chops for the meal.  They turned out great and everyone seemed to enjoy them.  After the dinner was over and our guests had left, I realized I only knew the "boyfriend" by his first name, Ben.  I felt bad about that.  I am a social clod at times and wished I had learned his full name.  I then asked my wife, Gayle, what Ben's last name was. 

(I will now spell his last name as given to me phonetically to highlight the humor and embarrassment of the situation.)

Gayle's response was, " I think it's "luh-vine" (as in grape vine).

"Really?" I responded.  How do you spell that?

She said, "L-E-V-I-N-E".

"Luh-vine."  Are you sure that's how he pronounces it?

"That's how Mom pronounces it," was her response.

Knowing my mother-in-law, I shook my head and said, "'Luh-veen.'  That's how you pronounce that spelling.  It's a common Jewish last name!"

"Are you sure? she asked."

"Oh, I'm pretty sure." I sarcastically confirmed.  I had just fed pork chops to a guy named Ben Levine!

It turns out that yes, he is of Jewish descent.  Luckily for me, he was not actively practicing the faith, but it took some time to figure this out, and there are those out there who may enjoy the internal turmoil I went through until this fact was confirmed.

But, you know, it would have been nice to have had a "heads up".

The Female Mechanic and the Local Florida Festival
This was one of my best "foot in the mouth" moments of my life.  I work as a Mechanical Design Engineer, which means I design manufacturing machines of all types.  I engineer and design the machines and then we have "Assembly Technicians" (mechanics) that assemble them on the assembly floor before we send them to the customer.  The assembly and what is involved in this job demands highly skilled technicians of widely varied abilities, and our company had many.  One of them was a woman.  You seldom see a woman in the technical fields I work in, but when you do, they are good.  As always, a woman has to be very good to succeed in what is strongly considered a man's field.  This woman, I will call her Randi, was good--very good.  She was good, but with a hard edge, which again wasn't out of place, because many of the men in this field have a hard edge.  They are especially cranky at the Design Engineers who don't always get every minute detail correct.

I can handle the hard edged men on the floor, but I wasn't sure about how to handle this woman, but through time I gained about as much respect from her as anyone would ever gain, and we developed an almost friendly relationship depending on what day of the week it was, of course.  Randi wasn't the most feminine of women, either.  I had wondered if, because of her looks and mannerisms, whether she was a Lesbian or not, though it really didn't matter to me, and somewhere along the line it was confirmed that she was.  Again, it doesn't matter except for the story that I will relate.

One day, Randi and I were talking about a vacation she was taking with her sister to visit her parents in an area of Florida that I was extremely familiar with.  We were talking about what she would do while there, and I popped up with the words, "Hey, you should go to the Mullet Festival!"  Before I could even realize how that sounded to her she barked back at me, "What the hell is that?!?"

Some serious back pedaling ensued as I tried to explain to her that a local fish of the area is the mullet, and as many a small communities all over the country do, that particular area had formed an all out festival around whatever they could single out as something, no matter how lame, that identified them as a community.  They had mullet feeds, the mullet ball, the crowning of Miss Mullet, and the highlight of the day was a mullet toss.

In my explanation, I said nothing of her sexual orientation, though we both knew it was at this very moment the big blue elephant in the room.  I, a heterosexual male had told a Lesbian woman she should attend a Mullet Festival.  It's hard to explain yourself with two size thirteens planted firmly in your mouth.

Earlier, I confessed that I am, at times, a social clod.  These two incidents don't go far in refuting this fact.