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i thought it was funny
I worked in a drug rehab with teenagers. Most of their joking was juvenile and perverse, but one day a patient told me a joke that was actually funny. I laughed so hard and couldn’t wait to tell my wife. I forgot about it for several hours until we were at a dinner party with […]
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almost lovers
I remember reluctantly going early to help prepare my great-uncle’s house for his 80something birthday last summer. There was this gorgeous girl helping with the food. I figured she was around my age and I wanted to “talk” to her and possibly get her number. My trip might end up not being a total waste, I thought. She was around my aunt a lot and the way they were talking it was like my aunt raised her or something but I was sure she wasn’t her child. Anyways, this girl was really good-looking, no joke, so I finally see her alone and I muster up the courage to go talk to her. And so it went … Me: “Hey” Her: “Hey ” … long awkward pause Me: *I point to my aunt* “Do you know Aunt Flo?” Her: “She’s my aunt” Me: “oh … that’s cool” … another awkward pause … “I guess that makes us cousins” Her: [with a rather sarcastic smile] “Yep” I die a little inside, make up some lame excuse about something I have to do and quickly walk away. I tried my best to not be seen by her the rest of the day. Frank – Earth
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I…I…I…I gotta go!!
When I was 14, I met this guy at a church camp. I thought he was very sweet but I did not reciprocate the feelings he had for me. He would give me chocolates and gave me this plastic necklace with an ‘A’ on it for my name. He also wrote me a sort-of love letter. I was freaking out. He was my first pursuer. Somehow he got my phone number and started calling me. He would call me collect, so my parents were paying for a phone call I did not want to take. Once he even called me at 11 PM, which made my parents pretty upset. I remember pretty well the last time he called me. We talked for a minute or so and then he said those six words a lot of people dread: I need to tell you something. I got really nervous. This is how our conversation went after that: “It’s like this…… I… I… I…” “You…?” “I li… I li… I…” Silence. “I, I gotta go!” “Me too!” I feel so bad for him now. I say he was the first person to tell me that he liked me, even though he never actually got to say it. Amelia – Somewhere
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ummm…why are you calling me?
In first grade I was friends with a girl that we will call Candice. First grade. We went to the same school pretty much for the next nine years and never spoke to each other. I’d see her in passing and would hear random bits about her, but that’s it. One night when I was a sophomore in high school the phone rang. My dad answered, “who? Candice? Micah, it’s for you. It’s someone named Candice White.” My dad smiled at me in a sort of wink wink way. I wondered why on earth Candice White would be calling me. She had become popular and was in a serious/crazy relationship with a guy in the very popular jock crowd and only just recovering from another crazy/serious relationship with another guy just like him. Everyone knew about it. I took the phone anyway, held my breath and answered. “Ummm…hi?” “Hey, Micah,” she said with a way too excited peppy voice. “Hi.” “Do you know who this is?” “Yes. What’s going on?” “I just wanted to talk.” “Ummm…ok. Why are you calling me?” “I was just thinking that we should start talking.” “Ok…” Realizing this was some strange attempt at asking me out, I went on to explain to her that I was intentionally not dating anyone and not going to. I had my heart set on Beth the Other Admin already. She responded with a few more sentences about how we should talk more. We never talked. We should just say “hey” and stuff in the hallways at school. Whatever. I said, “Ok…I guess.” The awkwardness continued for a month or two after this. We would see each other in the halls at school and say “hey” or “hi.” I tried to smile, but it was always a little creepy, and I was always slightly afraid of her two angry yet very cool jock boyfriends. Micah the Admin
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an indian in a store
My friends and I love to do costume parties. Once for my Native American friend’s birthday party we dressed up as Indians (Native American not India). I went all out. Like crazy. I’m the one on the right standing up. I was most obviously costumed. On the way to the party we decided we needed to grab a disposable camera, so I decided to work up the courage to walk into a gas station and buy one. Beth refused to go in with me. It would be fun and probably cheer up the cashier. Nope! I walked in. No response. I found the camera and went to the cashier. I smiled. She raised apathetic eyes and told me the price. Is she a robot? She never smiled, raised an eyebrow, chuckled or anything. All she accomplished was making me feel a bit more awkward. Micah the Admin
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my moose belly
A few years ago I had a group of friends that would hang out all the time. We became pretty comfortable with each other and so our humor took some strange turns. One of the things my wife and I decided was funny was my belly. I’ve always had a bit of a beer belly. I would do this thing where I’d lift up my shirt and make my hands like antlers on each side of my chest. It made a funny resemblance to a moose. People would always laugh. Beth would also wait til I was talking to someone, come up behind me and lift up my shirt randomly. This also made people laugh. Usually. One night one of our friends’ sister came over to the house we were at. We didn’t really know her, but she seemed comfortable with our rambunctious group. I was having a semi-formal talk with her and her brother just trying to get to know them both better. Beth came up behind me and WHAM! My shirt was lifted up for the new girl. I realized this wasn’t the right setting. Beth apparently did not. The girl looked at us with a mix of horror, discomfort and disgust. There was about a twenty second awkward silence until our little conversation disbanded. I’m pretty sure we never saw her again. Not once. Micah the Admin
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um…um…hehheh…uhh
The organization I work for has a couple hundred staff plus children and at times fifty or so students. They gather on Sunday evenings for a formal meeting. My wife and I had just returned from a trip to Thailand with two other girls, and we were asked to give a debriefing of our trip. Now, my job IS public speaking – I am a teacher. I am quite capable of impromptu one hour lectures, and I am generally efficient and comfortable doing so. This night I was too confident. We played a video for them, and then I had a brief two to five minute speech to make. It was all worked out in my head until the video stopped, and I looked out into the bright lights and three hundred staring faces. It had to be one of the more populated meetings. My mind went blank. I rattled off a powerful line about the movie and went blank again. I tried another of my planned points. This got me through a stuttering twenty seconds. My mind went blank. I had nothing else to pull from. After staring at the audience, saying, “um” five times, and laughing I turned to my teammates for help. They all shook their heads. They looked more nervous than me. I looked back at the audience and hit them with ten more “um”s and laughs. It felt like this went on for five minutes, but I think it was only two or three. Then I managed to say one last enthusiastic sentence and encourage people to go to Thailand. I walked off the stage trying not to look at anybody. My wife held my hand. That was nice, but it didn’t make it go away. As I write this, I’m actually getting nervous again. Micah the Admin
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devil child
When I was about eight or nine I went to a birthday party at a friends house, we did all the birthday stuff and then her mum announced it was movie time, we all piled into the lounge room and she put on Home Alone, I’d watched it already with my parents and we all […]
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the bag of hair
Several months after 9/11 I was in the Atlanta airport. I was “randomly selected” to have my bags extra searched. I guess I looked a little like a terrorist. To add to this luck, the two people assigned to search my bags were women [Insert the obvious stereotypes of women cops here]. My bags were over-stuffed, and the zippers were bulging. I cringed as they took things out of their crammed locations knowing that they would never get it all back in. I thought for sure that I had nothing bad in there, but I didn’t account for culture differences. One lady pulled out my nag champa incense and asked what is was with incredible attitude. I explained that it smelled good, and she confiscated it. She found matches and took them. She found laundry detergent and took it. Our friendship was on the fritz. Then it happened. She pulled out a small ziploc and my heart sunk. It was full of my recently chopped off hair and affectionately labeled “Junior”. She looked at me like I was the filthiest criminal to ever live and with much more attitude and confusion than before she loudly asked, “What is this?” I tried weakly to explain why it was funny to me and my friends. She let me keep it. I didn’t recover my dignity. Micah the Admin
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rigor mortis
I was taking a long drive with a few friends. We stopped at a gas station for drinks and bathroom. While we were getting back into the car my friend and I were rough housing. A girl behind us said, “You guys are gonna die!” This girl had just told us the day before that her mother had died through tragic circumstances. My friend replied quickly with an age old joke. “Your mom’s gonna die!” I didn’t see his face. I wish I had. Instead, I tried to top him. I said, “Yeah! She’s already dead, and rigor mortis is setting in!” Immediately I remembered about her mom and saw my friend’s face. He was terrified. I looked away from her as fast as possible, put my headphones on and avoided eye contact with her for the rest of the trip. I felt like a monster, and I still don’t like thinking about it. David – TN