Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Gimmee a "K"!

One day, the mother-in-law received an amusing letter from one of her daughters. It must have been unusually funny because the MIL invited me to read it.
Along one margin, there was a note regarding how to spell a granddaughter's name. As I turned the page sideways to read it, the MIL remarked, "Oh yes. I misspelled Kathy's name the last time I wrote. SIL likes to remind me that Kathy is spelled with a 'K'. But you don't *put* 'A' and 'K' together! 'A' goes with 'C'. Kathy is supposed to be spelled C-A-T-H-Y. Just because ~she~ (the SIL) spelled it wrong 30 years ago, doesn't mean ~I~ have to!"

Okay, there are some key points here:
1) You and I both know that when it comes to names, there ARE no rules,
2) She's been spelling her own granddaughter's name wrong...
3) ON PURPOSE...
4) For 30 freaking years!

So, after this unnecessary education on which vowels are *supposed* to follow which consonants, I very quietly asked, "Well, then, how do you spell Karen?"

Dead silence.

Her face turned red.

"Well!"

Some huffing and puffing.

"Well, they spelled THAT wrong, too!"

*** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***

The SIL had a laughing fit when I relayed the story to her months later.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

My mother insists on writing my husband's name "James" even though his name is "Jaime" (Jim, actually, he won't respond to Jaime). She does it to be spiteful.

Roses said...

Argh!
I have a friend whose name starts with the same initial as her husband's ex-girlfriend. Her mother-in-law often "accidentally" called her by the ex's name... but only when the husband was out of the room. Whenever he was IN the room, suddenly, the name was right.

Wouldn't it be nice to have absolutely NO conscience like that?

Thumbelina's Mom said...

If it's not one thing, it's your mother...or in-law...

Richmond said...

Oh holy cow! :)

Rave said...

Long ago, when Hubby and I were living together, we were in my car headed to a mutual friends house.

(prelude- my real name is CLOSE, and even RHYMES with his previous girlfriends name...)

Well, twice while driving, Hubby calls me by his previous g/f's name.

I tell him if he does it again, I will pull over and he can WALK the rest of the way.

He did it again about 10 minutes later.

I pulled over....ON THE FREEWAY...and told him to GET OUT!

He never did it again after that.