Nameless neighbour
"My nextdoor neighbour introduced himself when he moved in. I promptly forgot his name. I danced around it for the next five years. He was from a French-speaking part of Canada, so when talking with my wife, he was 'French guy next door'. Five years after meeting, he admits in a conversation that he'd forgotten my name. We have a good laugh and reintroduce ourselves. His name is Guy. I had it right the whole time, he is French Guy next door."
I can't take your call right now Dave...
Dave from Rotorua phoned a very good friend of his this week and she didn't answer the call. "She called me later to explain why she couldn't answer. She was having a colonoscopy and when the phone rang the doctor commented that she had a 'lovely ring tone'. He was completely oblivious to what he had said."
Family words
1. Two words introduced by grandchildren and firmly entrenched in the family vocabulary are, "tuggle" for a cuddle and "flamindingo" for, you guessed it, flamingo.
2. Hutupokawa for Pohutukawa as a 3-year-old.
3. Non-eyes (nighnighs) said to kids when kissing them Goodnight - my daughter always thought it was non-eyes because you closed your eyes to sleep. She was in her 30s when she discovered the error! The whole family now uses this expression.
4. When our granddaughter was very small, while folding the sheets between us, we would form a "hammock" and swing her in it. She would ask, can I have a "panic"?
5. Our young son David came up with a surprising phrase "Animation Barbie" for Demolition Derby some years ago – hilarious and hard to forget!
6. Our daughter used three self-explanatory family words. Foot nails, efflant and eebows.
7. Apparently, according to my mother, as a young child I called diarrhoea "swish poos". This has continued through the next generation.
