Churches...

Usually I'm not the person that laughs at what someone says. I mean, if they mean it to be funny, I laugh at it...but if they don't, well then I just think it can come off as being mean as if they're teleported back to middle school and countless nightmares where people point and laugh. So I try not to laugh at someone's stupid mistakes or weird quirks...but today I couldn't help it.

A co-worker and I were trying to pass the time during an email outage when we were talking about famous people and our encounters with them.

Wait, let me back up for a moment.

I was really active in my church in Oklahoma - partially because that's what you do in Oklahoma...go to church, get married, and have babies. Some of the time, this all happens before the age of 14, but not always.* Anyway, I had a great time there and when I moved here I figured it'd be a good way to get to know people here.

So I started visiting churches. One day I decided to go to one by my house...it's a HUGE church - about the size of our theatre in Oklahoma City. It was tough to find a parking space even in the lot for easily over 200 cars. Police were directing traffic. Seriously, it had a coffee bar in the atrium, stadium style seating, and even the flippy chair that one might find in a movie theatre. Not really my taste, but I was there and already had on panty hose, so I made the best of it. The preacher came onto the stage and made some big announcement about how they had a special guest that day and I figured that it was some sort of inside thing that only the regulars would understand. Anyway, he says something like, "Welcome, John Tesh!" And I thought "wow - he has the same name as the famous guy...weird." When the big camera depicted on the jumbo screen showed a close up, I realized that it was THE John Tesh. I couldn't believe it. I turned to the person next to me and literally said, "Holy Shit! That's John Tesh!" As you can imagine, my statement wasn't really appreciated. I was a little embarrased because even if you're wearing panty hose, they don't typically like you to curse in church. This story has made others laugh through the years, so it's a good one to tell in a situation such as what came up today.

Remember that a co-worker and I were trying talking about famous people... I mentioned that I had seen John Tesh. My co-worker asked about when/where. So I said "When I first moved here and I was looking for churches-" and I paused because my work phone started ringing. He then said, "Churches Chicken? Did you try the phone book or were you just driving around? Wow. I didn't even know that you liked fried chicken."

And I'm not sure why, but I laughed so hard I almost wet my pants. He felt horrible and although I felt bad because I was clearly laughing at him, I couldn't stop.

He was actually a great sport about it and I think I did an okay job about passing it off about it catching me off guard, but I found it also too funny not to share.

~A

*= For my friends from Oklahoma: I'm kidding. Rex (a friend and an Oklahoman) really was the one that said that it usually happened before 14...so I'm blaming him. :) But it was funny...so I had to steal it and put it in my blog.