Make a Man Blush

A week or so ago, I invited you to share your stories about things dogs have chewed on or how to make a grown man blush. I loved reading your replies!

Adelaine and Dysfunctional Mom told about dogs who loved chewing on used feminine products. Dysfunctional Mom also had a story about a dog who ordered a pay-per-view event while chewing on the remote control for the TV.

Which reminded me of a totally bizarre problem we had with our home phone earlier this year. It was rendered completely useless for anything but incoming calls because a tiny girl's fingers had been pressing buttons, and had managed not only to set an undisclosed 4-digit PIN, but used that PIN to key-lock the keypad. We couldn't use that phone to call out or to check messages until it had been factory-reset. So I can totally believe a dog could order pay-per-view TV, a taxi and a home-delivered pizza by chewing on a remote.

On to what can make a man blush.

Heather of the EO once discovered that a very elderly man lying still on the ground next to his car was not in fact dead, but rather ...err... fixing his car. I'm with Heather. I'd be doing CPR before he could say, "Pass me the wrench."

Hot Tub Lizzy likes to go to the store and load up on tampons and watch the male clerk try to scan the boxes without actually touching them. I like her style.

Maternal Mirth once inadvertantly left a 'stanky diaper' (love the term!) in her husband's boss' private office. If I understand the story right, the boss didn't notice until it got a little malodorous. I like that story because that could have been me!

My own dear Crazy Sister once found herself saying to a hardware store salesman, "I need an extension for the [here she made a clicking, ratcheting noise with her tongue] spanner so that it's long enough to take out the agitator of the washing machine so I can vacuum out all the gravel." Some of you spend your days saving lives and upholding justice; others of us vacuum gravel out of the bottom of washing machines.

Heather quite amazingly combined a Things-Put-Through-Laundry-Cycles Story with a Making-Men-Blush Story and told us of a little smile-shaped piece of metal caught in a clothes dryer that shorted out the whole machine. Heather confessed that the "little" piece of metal wasn't all that "little" afterall, and its existence seemed to horrify the repair man.

My own story involved 18-month-old Sonny Ma-Jiminy having a tantrum while we were hangers-on at a camp for high-school students that Mr de Elba was helping lead. One morning we were in the dining room and I was holding Sonny in my arms when he became upset at Some Minor Thing. He started screaming and complaining, drawing the attention of a group of teenage boys.

He wriggled out of my grasp and slid down my body. I held tightly to him with one arm while the other hand was trying to keep a bowl of cereal and milk from spilling on the carpeted floor. In order to manage both of these tasks, I slowly bent my knees and sat on the floor so I could put the bowl down and deal with Sonny.

I sat with my legs apart in a V-shape and Sonny slid down and out in front of me until he was lying between my legs, inching away from me. Screaming.

I smiled at the group of boys and said breezily, "We're fine here - we're just reenacting Birth!"

They were utterly horrified. I think I damaged them.