Aww fuck...
do I ever have a lot of these!

Okay, a bit of background first: my ex comes from a family with two kids, just her and her brother Rick. Her dad died in 1991, so she only has her mother and brother. Her mother is a sweet tempered ditz, kind of a Doris Day/June Cleaver/Edith Bunker as viewed on acid, someone you can't really get angry with as she's off in her own fluffy little world. She's a fanatical Catholic who I think very nearly became a nun. Her brother is a rather abrasive individual who has never had a girlfriend that anyone knows of. My ex and I used to debate whether or not he was gay- if he is, he'll never admit it, especially considering how much it would freak out his mother.

We used to go meet up with her mother now and then for lunch when we were living about an hour away. While it was nice enough, it invariably went the same way with her mother saying, "Now Lynne, have you heard anything from Rick? You know, I worry about him- he never calls, and when I call him he never really wants to talk about anything." And invariably my ex would fill her in on whatever little she had heard recently from Rick.

As we were driving out to one of these lunches I was saying to my ex how predictable the conversation was, and recited the above bit to her. She acknowledged that it did get a bit monotonous, but said that I was exaggerating. I shrugged it off as we entered the restaurant.

We had just gotten our drinks when her mother said the above bit, verbatim. My ex was struggling to keep a straight face through this and glared daggers at me for it as I sat there quietly smiling. When her mother finished my ex had just taken a sip of her gin and tonic.

Ever just have one of those moments when you give in to an impulse? Without missing a beat I turned to her mother and said, "Well, Lynne thinks that Rick is gay."

My ex inhaled gin and tonic and began coughing, my mother-in-law's jaw hit the table on its way to her lap, and I sat back and drank some beer in anticipation of the now much more entertaining lunch conversation.

There was lots of talk after that, and I was thoroughly yelled at by my wife, my sisters and my mother over the course of the next week. I simply smiled quietly and nodded, and relived the moment with the gentle glow of a job well done...
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Fri 20 Apr 2007, 17:06, Reply)