A Little Too Much Rhett . . .

Anyone who knows my husband knows that he loves being socially quirky. You may not know, however, that he is, quite frankly, bizarre. Let me give you just one example:

One night, Rhett and I were driving to visit his parents who lived about an hour away from where we lived. For some reason, which I don't recall, I was driving, which is extremely unusual, as Rhett usually drives everywhere we go, as he cannot stand my driving, which, by the way, is uncommonly good.

We were driving on a dark mini-highway, when I reached over to give Rhett's leg a little love pat. Strangely, instead of denim, my hand met with his bare skin. Somehow, without me knowing it, he had stripped completely, shirt, pants, and everything underneath.

I believe my reaction was a mortified shriek, which I think is what he was going for. (Well, he probably had something different in mind, but I have my standards!) I'm pretty sure that my mind wasn't on my driving at that point.

I had more important things to worry about, like how did he get those pants off without me noticing? And more importantly, what did I get myself into in this marriage? And even more importantly, will the trucker we are going to pass be able to see him nude from his elevated cab? I'm sure I don't need to tell you what I did next. I sped up, just to find out.

And then it was Rhett's turn to shriek. . .

Hey, look at me!

At my church, I'm in charge of leading the littlest ones in songs of praise. It's really a fun job most of the time, and I really enjoy it. However, today was our "program" meaning that we took the entire first hour and the little kids had the spotlight, singing and reading their parts.

Or rather my rear end had the spotlight. Because the little ones are so little, the ones behind the piano had a hard time seeing my hands (Although they're not missing much, as I just wave my hands however I want. I rarely am on the beat, and I don't care. And neither do they. They are, after all, just little ones.), so I ended up standing up on a chair in the middle of the front row, with my backside directly to the entire congregation. Do you blame me for wearing Support Everything (hosiery, bra, girdle, etc.)?

There's nothing worse than having your bootie (why, oh why, does my spell checker not recognize "bootie"? I must have an uptight spell checker . . .) upstage 100 beautiful children from the ages of three to twelve. But I believe I accomplished it. Lucky, lucky congregation. Oh, there's more where that came from. Just let me take off my Support Everything, and you'll see exactly what I mean.

My dear friend said, "Don't worry, I made sure we're sitting right behind you." Well she didn't, but her husband did. "Tim's making sure no one gets a good peek," she assured me.

"Oh, honey," I replied, "you better be careful because I think Tim's sitting there so he'll have the best show in the house."

My husband was a little sad not to be in Tim's spot. He tells me he wanted to reach up and give me little pats throughout the program. I told him I think I already stole the show enough. But hey, there's always next year!

Chick-a-Bam-Bam-Ban-Ow!

We're not nice people. I'm just forewarning you so you won't be too surprised when I tell you this next weird, quirky thing that we do. Just keep in mind, I already know we're not nice, so don't pepper me with comments about how mean we are. I already know!

In the course of our married life, Rhett and I have had the opportunity to move around a little bit, and every time we do we have to meet a whole new group of people at church. But sometimes we're a little bit lazy about learning names at first. But we still like to talk about people (especially crazy comments that they might make in church, etc.), so we have our own system of describing people to each other. And it's kind of mean.

We nickname people. Here are some of the nicknames we have used over the years to help each other understand who we are talking about: Man-Talker (obviously a woman with a very, very deep voice), The Giants (This whole family was over six feet tall! They were huge!), Big Hair Lady (I think this one speaks for itself), The Weasleys (a family of redheads), and my favorite, Chick-a-Bam-Bam-Ban-Ow! (let's simply say that there was a very . . . um . . . interesting sense of style associated with this one).

The problem is sometimes (like in Chick-a-Bam-Bam-Ban-Ow!'s case) occasionally we would get to know these people and really like them. But still, we called them by their nickname in private because as I think I've mentioned before, we're just not that nice. But we did feel a little bit of guilt . . . but not enough to make us stop nicknaming. Another drawback was that Ivy picked up on the Chick-a-Bam-Bam-Ban-Ow! nickname and she started saying it whenever she saw that lady too. She was two years old, so we really should have been teaching her to be nice. But whatever.

One time my brother Josh (you know, the famous organist power player) came to church with us. Rhett was pointing out all the people whom we had nicknamed. He looked at us like we were crazy mean (which we are), and then he pointed to a woman in a wheelchair. "So, what do you call her? Hot Wheels?"

"That is SO mean!" I protested. But I have to admit, that's what we called her from then on. I just recently thought that maybe other people do this too, and I wonder what they would nickname me. A few thoughts: "Lady who can't dress her kids in matching clothes," or "Horsey" (since I rarely am seen these days without an accompanying ponytail . . .) or maybe "Pauncho" (since I haven't quite lost the belly from my three children).

What nicknames have you had for people? (And don't pretend you're all better than me, you know you do this, too!) What do you think people would nickname you?

10 Things I Love About Rhett

For those of you who hang out with us a lot, you may find it hard to believe that Rhett and I really do like each other. The best part is that we really like each other despite, and because of, all the quirky things we do. So just to give you a glimpse into the weirdness that is my husband: here's ten reasons why I really find him fascinating.

1) He loves to watch "The Bachelor." Seriously--it's his dirty little secret. He can't get enough of the "hi-jinks" (his words not mine) that they get up to. You should've heard how excited he was when they pulled a twin switcheroo in this season's third episode. He loves Monday nights just because "The Bachelor" is on. We have to put the kids to bed early and everything.

2) He loves my mom. Really, they could go on vacation together without me or my dad and have a much better time than if we were there. He calls her "Mare-mares" (her name is Marilyn) to her face. He's tried to get our kids to call her "Maa-maw Memma". Fortunately, they have resisted this.

3) He hid the fact that he bought a Dodge Caravan from his father for almost four months. He knew that it didn't get the best Consumer Reports ratings, and his dad loves Consumer Reports, so voila! He avoided the topic completely.

4) To him, social awkwardness is comfy. He loves breaking social rules. I thought this was funny when we were dating, but now it's just embarrassing. He always asks our waiters and waitresses personal questions. And he LOVES to embarrass me. Like how he always tells everyone that our first kiss was on our mission--totally not true, but still embarrassing.

5) He's one of the tightest people with money I know. He hates the word tight: he prefers frugal or careful. But, he's tight. When we were first married, he used to work at the credit union where we banked (or credit unioned, I suppose) and he would call me ten minutes after every purchase I made questioning it's necessity or cost. He and one of my brother-in-laws have formed a club called "Financial Fascists" because they are both like money Nazis. Really.

6) He's extremely careful about keeping things nice. When we were engaged, I got in the car in the autumn and he had cut out cardboard to lay down over all the carpet in his car so that no one could ruin his carpet with their wet feet.

7) He's pretty confident. He's not ashamed of much about himself. He'll tell anyone who will listen about how he got ringworm from StyleAmerica, yet he goes and gets his hair cut there every time, even after they gave him ringworm.

8) He's a little bit zany. I went into a place where he worked about five years ago and the receptionist (who was pushing 70) said, "Oh, we just love your husband. When it's a slow work day, he and I will pretend we're ice figure skaters and we skate all around the lobby floor." Hmmmm . . .

9) He's a fabulous dad, but sometimes he forgets all his kids are four and under. For example, Ivy's favorite show to watch with her dad is Nacho Libre. And both of my kids think "Another One Bites the Dust" by Queen is about the best song ever. This morning, I took the kids to preschool and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" was on when I turned on the car. To my surprise, they sang along and requested to hear it again, and again, and again. One guess about who introduced them to that!

10) He has the biggest appetite of anyone I've ever met. His parents call him "Garbage Gut" and I understand why. The man can pack it down. His favorite holiday is Thanksgiving, and not for the company--he really just loves the food!