Share your horror stories of foot-in-mouth moments you or others have perpetrated upon the innocent.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

Answers

I have to start, because I have good one from a recent encounter with my Grandmother.

GM: "Aaaaalllisoooonnn.... dew yew have a pretty dress to wear to First Sun-dy [family event]?"

Me: Well, Grandmother, I have a lot of dresses. I have several pretty ones.

GM: "Well... huuuunnneyyy, just be sure you wear one that... well... how do I say this?.... slims you down..."

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

I once told a joke to a group of people about a one-eyed guy who owned a foul mouthed parrot. Upon the completion of the joke, I look up and realize that one of the people in the group is one of my father's employees, and yep, he has a glass eye. Decorum, that's my middle name.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

I did this all the time when I used to work as a shampoo girl at a beauty salon. Once I was shampooing a woman who was a teacher at the small elementary school I had attended, so she and I sort of knew each other. She had had polio as a child and walked with a pronounced limp. We were talking about the new fitness center that had just opened on our side of town, and how she and her daughter had joined it, and how the pool was great, etc. She was definitely giving me a "Wow, it's tough to be working out again but I'm enjoying it!" vibe. So when we start talking about aerobics, I ask her, "So, can you do an aerobics class?" My INTENDED meaning was like, "Wow, I know sometimes those aerobics classes can whip your ass and it's hard to keep up, especially if you haven't worked out in awhile!" But by the GLARE she gave me, I knew she thought I meant, "So with your crazy assed bum leg, can you even DO aerobics?" Um, oops. I didn't even try to backpedal on that one.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

I am just sitting here thinking about this and I bet I could kill greenspun's server with just the crap that I'VE said to people.

I once wrote a gushing letter to an online journaller, telling her her life inspired me to really appreciate all the things I have because somebody always has it worse. Yeah. She was involuntarily separated from a loved one at the time and I was all, "Your writing inspires me to thank my lucky stars my husband's with me." I suck.

This lady at my old job had a picture of her daughter hanging in her cubicle. To be frank, the girl (about 16) had a space between her two front teeth you could drive a Volkswagen through, and with that and the goofy pose she was in, I assumed she was wearing joke teeth. I was all, "DANG! I like her teeth, ha ha." People, she those were no joke teeth. Luckily my coworker was very nice about it, and explained that her daughter couldn't have braces because of some bite condition, etc. etc. I was approximately two inches tall.

One time at the hair salon I asked this lady how her holidays went. And she was like, "Oh, they were horrible." Now I didn't know this lady AT ALL, but of course being ME I was like, "Oh no, really? Why?" Then she proceeded to unload this big story, all about how this was her first Christmas divorced from her husband of 25 years, she didn't get to see her kids, blah blah blah and she started CRYING. Then she told my boss that I was NOSY and she really didn't appreciate the interrogation and she was deeply upset and never coming back as long as I was the shampoo girl. The hell? I still don't consider that one my fault.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

One of the Hannahs on this forum emailed me to congratulate me on my pregnancy, and now I'm pretty sure I assumed it was the wrong one. And wrote a detailed response to one of the other Hannah's journal entries.

I mean I am so bad it could almost be considered charming. Right???

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

I do this kind of thing all the time too. For instance, I was once meeting some online people for the first time, and one of the attendees was debating moving to the area where we were celebrating, instead of staying in Wisconsin. Another firend said, "If she moves here, I'll buy her a round of cheese as big as her head!" (Cheesehead, Green Bay thing).

I said, "Damn, that's gonna be some expensive cheese."

People *never* want to hear they have huge heads.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

...Lest they cry themselves to sleep in their huuuuuuuuuge pillows.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

I'm sure I've done this a million times. Luckily I've managed to block them all out.

Oh, except for the one time in elementary school when it was Custodian Appreciation Week or something and my class made this huge banner. Most of the kids signed something like "Thanks!" or "You're the best!" or whatever. Wanna know what I wrote?

"It's a dirty job, but someone's gotta do it."

Now, in my defense, I don't think I had any idea what this meant or why my friend Chrissy was like, YOU are such a snit.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 2002

I also lack the filter between my brain and my stupid stupid mouth. Just a couple of days ago chatting with the DCWs I was bitching about my weight gain and said something like, "You don't even want to know how much I weighed at the doctor's office. I'm a big fatty fat fat."

So of course, when asked, I told my weight. Which, of course, immediately made everyone there who weighed more than me feel like I just called them a big fat cow. And I did try to explain that I'm very short and carry weight really badly, but it was still a stupid and insensitive thing to say. Which makes me fat AND mean.

-- Anonymous, May 23, 2002

Perhaps I once expounded on my utter amazement at how many bright and savvy young women 'accidently' get pregnant in their senior year of university, after years of being perfectly able to manage their birth control and surprisingly after landing boyfriends with good future prospects, and how astonished I was that these same girls always managed to do so late enough in the year to still be slim June brides.

And perhaps this wry observation, made at a League cocktail reception after a drink or two was, in fact, made to two women who themselves had 'surprisingly' become pregnant in their fourth years, respectively, of university, soon after landing college boyfriends with trust funds and good prospects.

I learnt my lesson. Now I only talk about the weather, the garden, and other people's health.

-- Anonymous, May 23, 2002

My fiance and I ran to Bed, Bath and Beyond the other night to look at curtains for our house, and we ran into another couple that we know. They are getting married in about 6 weeks, so of course we started talking wedding and invitations, blah blah blah. Somehow, the subject of showers came up. Personally, I don't like bridal showers...they seem like a way to get extra gifts out of people. So I impart my feelings on showers and didn't think twice about it.

The next day, in the mail, I got the invite to her bridal shower that she had mailed out days before. I felt about three inches tall.

-- Anonymous, May 27, 2002