It All Goes Back to Body Functions

Sheryl and I have some pretty daffy conversations sometimes. As I have mentioned before, they usually occur when we are both driving to work. They run the gamut from the everyday mundane such as “How is the weather in Philly? It is raining in Schuylkill County.” to the completely ridiculous “I think I would be much happier if I were a cat..“ To which the response is appropriately enough, “What about a dolphin?”  I will let you figure out who said what.

One morning Sheryl offered up to me that she wanted to raise pachyderms upon her retirement.
“Pachyderms.” I said.
“Yes, pachyderms,” she replied.

It was later found out that my sister was talking about alpacas. She wanted to raise them for their wool. Pachyderms don’t have wool. That is the scientific name for the elephant family. My sister had stated she wanted to raise elephants. Love her dearly, I got a chuckle out of that one. I think we have all been there with the honest misuse of words.

The other day while driving and chatting, we began discussing road rage. Nothing too major or violent though. With our lengthy commutes, we will give the occasional stare down to other drivers. I will resort to giving those people tailing me the sudden reverse stop gesture with my hand. My signal means 'SLOW THE F*#$ DOWN NOW!" without giving them the finger. My sister instead screams in the rearview mirror, “GET THE F*#$ OFF MY ASS!!!!” as if they can see and hear her yelling. I have heard her do this while on the phone with me and I crack up laughing at her screaming.

We often crack each other up so much, we have to take a break and refocus on our driving. Take our discussion one Thursday morning. I told Sheryl that in preparations for my upcoming vacation, I was laying out clothes and discovered that I couldn’t get my bathing suits buttoned up. Had I gained that much weight? I looked at the labels and both said 30 inch waist. I couldn’t have gained THAT much weight. Maybe the nylon shrunk from repeated washings and dryings. My sister politely informed me that nylon by its very nature, does not, in fact, shrink. So you are saying I am a fat cow, OK I get the hint.

I then said to Sheryl, "Well, you know you can lose a pound or two just by going to the bathroom."
“WHAT??” she screamed cracking up.
“Its true! I always take a pound off for poo 'n pee."
“That can’t be true!” she retorted.
“IT IS!” I exclaimed. “You figure your true weight is actually a pound or two less once you get rid of the poo 'n pee.”
“I don’t believe it,” she replied
“Well I weighed myself one morning and I was 170 lbs. I took a poo and then weighed myself again. 169. I am sure I poo’d a pound of poo!”
Sheryl laughed and said, “Why does every conversation we have end up talking about body functions?!”
“You are right Sheryl, it’s something in our family,” I replied laughing.

And this is just not relegated to my sister! I was visiting my brother in San Diego the other week and I mentioned to Adam that I really like the Fiber One bars he has at his house as a quick breakfast. He said to me, "Well Angelica (my niece) really likes them, so we started picking them up. I like them because you know sometimes I get these old man poops and they help out."

"Oh you mean like you are constipated?" I asked.
Readers, you get to a certain age and family members will just easily discuss ANYTHING!
"Well yeah, and I eat one and then go to the bathroom, and BOOOOOM! It all comes out at once."
I said, "I know exactly what you mean! You have to hold on for dear life!"

He and I started laughing over this mutual revelation.