A Funny Story and Other Assorted Stuff

So the other night when I was a chaperone at a youth weekend, I played "What's your most embarrasing moment?" with my group of 13-year-olds. I had some lame stories about falling down in my high school hall . . . but now I think I have an even better one!

Let me tell you a story . . .

Yesterday, I decided to pop by the ATM machine to get a few dollars of cash out. I drove up, put my card in, punched the password, then received a rude little note coughed out of the machine that informed me, "Card retained. Too many incorrect passwords attempted." What?? I angrily grabbed the receipt and said to myself, "Now, I can't even use my card at a store," and "I get the lovely hassle of waiting for another card to arrive in the mail," and "What do you think this thing is doing, taking my card?"

I decided to go into the adjoining bank and ask if there was any way they could get my card back out for me. The Bank Guy (looked like the head of some important operation) immediately took my case, looking a bit perplexed. "It took your card? We've never had that happen before." "Well, it happened to me. It took my card." He shook his head and said, "You know, I don't even see HOW this could happen. Our machine doesn't even take your card. You just swipe it and keep it."

Okay, now THAT was a little interesting. How could it take my card if it was a little swipey machine? Then, dawn began to quickly break in my mind. Oh no . . . did I just swipe my card? is there some way that it didn't take my card? I fished around in my purse, trying to reach my billfold without Bank Guy noticing what I was doing. In the meantime, he said, "Let's go out to the machine and see what's going on."

We did just that . . . all while I rummaged in my purse, found my self-proclaimed "missing" card and stuffed it into the bottom of my purse (just in case he demanded to see my billfold or something!). I knew now what had happened. I had swiped the card, put it back in my billfold automatically, then received the mean little "card retained" note and just got mad that it said such a thing to me--just believing what my mean little note had told me had happened.

Okay, so inside right now I'm laughing and cringing at the same time. And am stuck with a quandary: Do I tell nice Bank Guy (who is now standing at the machine, trying to figure out how in the world it sucked my card up; saying things like, "In three years, this has never happened. There's even a little bar here that protects it, so there's no way it can go through") that I just realized that I'm an idiot? Or do I just go along with my story? Yep, you guessed it--"That's my story and I'm sticking to it." I sit there and just shake my head along with him, saying I have no clue how it happened but it did. I left him standing there dazed and confused, and rushed as quickly to my car as possible without looking desperate to burn rubber.

I sat down in my car, laughed hysterically and inwardly (in case Bank Guy was looking at me), then called Gary and shared my idiocy. I figure that Bank Guy quickly realized what happened and went back into the bank, where all the employees had a big ole laugh on my expense!

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And some other stuff . . .

* I'm so proud because I have cooked dinner for us three--count them, three!-nights in a row at the house. I have not ordered pizza, picked up hamburgers, or copped out some other way. On Monday, I made spaghetti and garlic bread; on Tuesday, I made Hamburger Helper (okay, maybe that's a cop-out but all of my kids love it) and fruit salad; and last night I made beef tips, rice, and assorted veggies. AND, I haven't bought a fast food lunch in more than five or six days. It's been salad and pastas and just something here from the house for Sydney and I. I'm consciously trying to be better about not spending so much money on take-out food! (although I'm seriously jonesing for some Taco Casa this morning!) So, yay me!

* I've added a blog to showcase some of my scrapbook layouts. It's just a place for me to store some of them and it's at www.scrapcreations.blogspot.com. If you want to see any of them . . .

* It's only 16 days until college football kicks off! I'm back to listening to my sports radio shows, checking out football websites everyday, and just on pins-and-needles ready to go walk into Bryant Denny for the opening game!

* My printer is on the outs and I'm seriously upset about that! I have several scrapbook layouts I'm wanting to do, but they all involve computer journaling. (Insert crying here.)

Have a great Thursday, and I hope you enjoyed some laughing at my expense!