I’m going to do something different and record my Quick Takes as a sound file. If you want to skip listening to the file (which isn’t going to randomly start playing unless you hit the play button), just click on the word “more…” and it will take you below the cut where you can read the transcript.

This week, we’re going to discuss things that have been said to me that fall under the category of “I can’t believe they just said that!” Names have been changed to protect the stupid.

–1–
“So when are you due?” Paraphrasing Dave Barry: “Never ask a woman if she’s pregnant unless you can see the baby descending from her legs.” I hate to admit that I’ve been asked this more than once and all of those times were BEFORE I got pregnant with Daniel. It reminds me of that scene in “Two Weeks Notice” when the Hugh Grant character asks the Legal Aid lawyer if she’s pregnant and she goes off on him. When I did finally get pregnant, I announced it with a shirt that said “Yes, I’m pregnant. We aren’t finding out the baby’s gender. I’m due in June. No, you can’t touch my belly”

–2–
“It’s not like Jon actually does anything during the week.” Background: my husband Jon is a pastor. Most people realize that his week is pretty packed but there’s a small minority who think he just works a couple hours on Sunday. It’s not like he has council meetings (in Montana, it was weekly), Bible studies at the local nursing home, pastoral visits, hospital visits, sermon preparation, office work (in Minnesota and Montana, he was his own secretary), committee meetings, Confirmation classes to teach, counseling to do with various people, ministerium meetings, and continuing education. OF COURSE HE DOES ALL THAT FOR FUN! What was I thinking?

–3–
“Why isn’t Daniel doing _______? My child did that at his age.” Thank you for reminding me that my son has developmental delays. I hadn’t noticed. No wonder I spend many hours with therapists and child development people! Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go bang my head against a wall.

–4–
“Is your child retarded?” This question is probably the one which will cause me to stab you repeatedly with a spoon. How dare you ask me a question like that! Were you raised by wolves?!?!?!?!? OK… on a more serious note, my online friend Kathleen Basi has a link to R-Word.Org on her site which an organization that seeks to rid the popular jargon of the word “retarded” because it’s misused and frequently said in a very rude way.

–5–
“Daniel isn’t waving at me. You should socialize him better!” *facepalm* Daniel is socialized just fine. He just doesn’t like YOU. He’s also seriously behind in his language acquisition and is only now learning to wave “good-bye” but I have no desire to explain that to boorish people.

–6–
“Why do you wear black all the time? You should wear _______!” This was a frequent complaint of Frieda, one of our “special” people in one of Jon’s parishes. She had the brilliant idea that I should be wearing pastels and bright colors… which look crappy on me because I have autumn coloring. As for the black, can I help it if Abby Sciuto from NCIS is my role model?

–7–
“A girl as smart as you should be able to find a way to work from home.” This was said by Loretta, one of our other “special” people upon learning that I had landed a full-time job in 2007. Considering that this was right before the recession and jobs were scarce where we lived, I was pretty happy to get the job and Loretta somewhat dashed my happiness. Besides, the point of the job was to get AWAY from people like her and to have a life outside of the parish and the politics therein.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.