Monday, November 27, 2006

The Game of Life is Hard to Play, I'm Gonna Lose It Anyway

Here are some conversations of note from the holiday. Between working extra hours and visiting family there is little time to blog.

My Wife's family has a tradition of playing a stock-market card game called "Pit" during camping trips and holidays. My brother-in-law, Phil, and I had the lowest scores in the game. At one time, Phil was down to -160 points but then won a hand to bring him up to -105. My score was -100.

Phil: "I think you are going to win the title of Biggest Loser, Emmett. I'm still losing but I think you will overtake me."

Me: "Only a true loser would be excited that they are not going to be the Biggest Loser in the game. I'm going to set the bar really high and shoot for getting zero points this hand." (I failed at that)

Phil: "I'm losing but overall you are way more of a losery loser than I am..."

Emilee (Phil's wife): "Phil! You are being so rude. Do you even hear what you are saying? You are being SO rude."

Phil: "I'm being rude? Didn't you hear what he said to me a minute ago? He said that he only loses gradually but that I COME ON STRONG AS A LOSER..."

Eleanor (my wife): "Are you worried that Phil will offend Emmett? Don't worry about it. Emmett can take it."

By this point I was laughing so hard I lost track of the conversation. I AM the Biggest Loser.


Here are some sweet tidbits from my daughter:

#1

Eleanor: "Are you ready to go, Olivia?"

Olivia: "I'm getting ready. I have to hurry. I'm pretending I'm late for work."

#2

Eleanor (to my brother Joel): "Did Olivia just tell you that you have girl-hair?"

Joel: "Yeah."

Eleanor: "Don't worry about her. She told you that you have girl-hair because you have a ponytail, she told her cousin Aaron that he has girl-hair because he is blond and she tells Emmett that he has Dora-the-Explorer-hair."

Joel (to Olivia): "We are ALL boys, Olivia."

olivia: "Yeah. Boys with girly hair."


Ethan has already decided that he wants to be a bat for Halloween next year. It turns out that his grandmother has an old bat costume that one of Ethan's uncles used for Halloween years and years ago. Now when we visit grandma, Ethan likes to hang out in the bat costume. After wearing the costume for a few hours, Ethan got a pen and paper and scribbled out this message:

"I'm not a frade. I got my (he drew a picture of a CAPE) and my (he drew a picture of vampire TEETH). I got v.nokalrs (BINOCULARS) looking for Jracula."

We are going to keep that paper until we die.

The other night I had to work with the brain-damaged guy again. At 4 am he turned to me and said:

"I wish I was working with you the other night when I fell asleep and crashed my truck. I feel awake tonight. Talking to you is better than listening to the radio."

Another landmark compliment in my life:

Talking to me is BETTER than listening to the radio.

5 comments:

PsychDoctor said...

the other day, we were going to my 13-year-old's football game and my 6-year-old daughter just had to wear a cat halloween costume we picked up at GAP post-Halloween sale a few years ago. Much to my family's chagrin, I let her wear it to the game. She got some strange looks, but maybe she learned how to deal with peer pressure by being the wierdo and not caring... :)

Anonymous said...

I think you should pretty much be proud of being the biggest loser. At least you can be the winner of something.

Native Minnow said...

Talking to you is better than listening to the radio huh? I guess that depends on what station you're listening to.

I'll bet that if I would have been playing that game with you that I would have taken the title of biggest loser. And I'd have been proud to do it.

Native Minnow said...

By the way, I want you to post a picture of you and a picture of Dora-the-Explorer so that we can see if Olivia is right about your hair. What a funny kid.

Anonymous said...

I laughed out loud when I read the Dora the Explorer hair cut.