Well, It's Funny to Me

1. Another bumper sticker: "OH NO, NOT ANOTHER LEARNING EXPERIENCE."

2. Nora from the back seat pipes up, "I have a joke. Poo sandwich."

Followed by her version of Santa Claus is Coming to Town, "You better not poo, you better not pee!"

We stifle giggles, then tell her to leave those words in the bathroom!

She keeps singing in her sweet helium-high voice. "He sees you when you're pooping. . ."

The only threat that stops this scatological onslaught is the dreaded "Car Time Out," a punishment I don’t how to inflict but luckily have yet to enforce since she hasn't called my bluff.

3. The worst Christmas lyric ever, so horrible, I have to sing along lustily in merry disbelief and amazement:

There's a world outside your window and it's a world of dread and FEAR/
Where the only water flowing is the bitter sting of TEARS/
And the Christmas bells that ring there are the clanging chimes of DOOM/
Well tonight thank God it's them instead of YOU!

The Onion opines on this and other jaw-dropping lapses of judgment in the name of Christmas.

4. On the way to Randy's office Christmas party, he helps me cram employee spouses' names and interns' marital status. But when Randy says, "His name is Martin. He goes by Marty Marinari. Nah, I'm just kidding," I have no sense of humor.

"Don't pull my leg tonight," I snap. "I'm so brittle, it might fall off. And then I'd have to beat you with it."

(Actually, the party was wildly fun. "I'm not sure I'll drink tonight," I had tensely predicted, then quick-sipped two cranberries and vodka, followed by some toasty Chardonnay. Randy and I danced, stupid but not sloppy, making silly faces and quitting while we were ahead.

Randy's company always has a great big holiday party, with trip giveaways, a moving speech by the president about family and company milestones and a much anticipated, very long and very funny video recapping the year's work. Well, it started as a recap of the year's commercials, but the work part has been shrinking in the face of the silly skits. Oh you know. Recreations of music videos with rewritten lyrics full of inside jokes. Scenes of various mucus being distributed on the fastidious guy's desk. Shots of exaggerated assistant abuse under Donald Fagen's lovely falsetto: "I'm a fool to do your dirty work, oh yeah." Sweet grade-school photos of long time employees, followed by present day shots in the same pose. "HE'S THE SAME!" I'm screaming by this point, buzzed, moved, delighted.)