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I'm a J-E-R-K
I don't know what I'm going to do when my kids learn how to spell. I rely so heavily on spelling things with my husband that we might not have anything to say to one another anymore. Unfortunately, I sometimes forget that other adults do know how to spell and that my "secret" language is really not very secret.
At a restaurant: "Honey, I'm S-P-Y-I-N-G on that T-A-B-L-E. She's being such a B-I-T-C-H!"
My husband looks at me stunned. He had no idea he married such an idiot. The conversation screeches to a halt at the next table. The man and woman glare at me, especially the woman; if I'm not mistaken, the man looks fairly smug.
Whispered at a birthday party: "That kid's an A-S-S-H-O-L-E!" My 8 year old niece standing beside me looks up with a devilish grin, "I know how to spell you know."
Apparently, I need to freely say inappropriate things at any moment. Yes, I was the girl who spoke Pig Latin, Gibberish, and Oppish. (I knopow hopow topo spopeak opit evopen nopow.) I am unable to either a) keep my mouth shut and my nasty thoughts to myself, or b) wait until later.
My ability with languages (yes, I'm gonna go ahead and give myself credit as a linguist here) may come in handy when I can understand my kids and their idiot friends in the future. I'll know when they're talking about crushes, telling secrets to leave someone out, or swearing in front of me. I plan on keeping my fluency a secret until the perfect time when I can shock and awe everyone by telling them to fopuck off in their own tongue.
In the meantime, I need to learn to control myself. I need to constantly remind myself that the people around me are literate. Ironically, the person who I'm most often spelling things to, my husband, is totally unable to keep up. I can spell-speak just about as quickly as I can speak normally, (because I'm such a good linguist). Then I look at him as he slowly spells to himself what I said, completely missing letters and my whole meaning. In return, when he speaks to me in spell-speak, he spells the wrong words:
"I B-O-U-G-H-T ice-cream for the K-I-D-S," he'll spell in the middle of dinner. Guess who is immediately done with dinner?
"Y-O-U look R-E-A-L-L-Y sexy today." C'mon! "Mommy, what's sexy mean?"
Thank God for my smart phone and Twitter. If during a conversation with me I whip out my phone and start furiously typing up, say, 140 characters, you'd better believe you said something spell-speak worthy and I just have no one to spell it to. I'm a J-E-R-K.
Comments (12)
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Report Tue Oct 23, 2012 - 10:23 pmToo funny! We totally do the spell speak, but that is truly a limited time solution. And half the time I miss letters when I'm spelling out loud.Reply -
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Wed Oct 10, 2012 - 7:45 pm
Here in the Deep South, we say "bless her/his/their/your heart" It means everything from "good grief she's a bitch" to "maybe I should bake her a casserole" depending on the inflection. No one can possibly indict you for speaking ill of them, even if you are.Reply -
1 reply, Last reply by Allison Hart on Thu Oct 11, 2012 at 11:54 pm
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Tue Oct 9, 2012 - 11:54 pm
Hey Allison, Great post! I would have loved to have seen the look on her face. You should check out sign language. You can always pretend you "signed" it wrong, except the universal middle finger.Reply -
1 reply, Last reply by Allison Hart on Wed Oct 10, 2012 at 1:36 am
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Report Tue Oct 9, 2012 - 6:24 pmI lucked out that my husband is good with spell speak. I think it may have something to do with his 8 yrs of military training and all the freaking acronyms that go with it. We actaully had to advance our spell speak to use the Phonetic Alphabet ever since my niece learned to spell. I suck at the true version so I make it up to suit me, like "should we stop for some Igloo-Charlie-Echo Charlie-Radish-Echo-Alpha-Monkey on the way home". It totally throws the kids off as to what we're saying and they have yet to decipher it since I'm always changing it a bit.Reply
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2 replies, Last reply by Janie Emaus on Wed Oct 10, 2012 at 12:46 am
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Tue Oct 9, 2012 - 6:31 pm
Why has no one made the cunning linguist joke yet? Am I the first? Lame, lame on me. My hubs simply can't spell. It's like, "Babe, let's go for C-A-K-E." He's like, "Coke? What? Let's do coke?"Reply -
1 reply, Last reply by Allison Hart on Tue Oct 9, 2012 at 6:32 pm
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Report Tue Oct 9, 2012 - 5:44 pmLOL! I can spell a lot better than my hubs, not only can I spell better, I spell quicker, I spelled H-E and then followed with "double toothpicks" it was so quiet you could here crickets chirping in the background-he was trying so hard to figure it out...Reply
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1 reply, Last reply by Allison Hart on Tue Oct 9, 2012 at 6:00 pm
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