I am an Ass

I attended a networking happy hour thing for tech people at a local -- let's call it a restaurant -- last night, at which I drank too many beers and stayed entirely too late, because that is what I do. So when I got home it seemed like a good idea to get on the computer and post a silly thing I had seen earlier that day as my Facebook status. It was, "Why isn't phonetic spelled the way that it sounds?"

Hilarious, right? Drink six pints of beer and try again. It gets funnier.

I have an old friend that I have known since third grade who has been teaching elementary school (like first graders or some such) since she got out of college. We'll call her Mrs. Jones, since during the few months we dated in grade ten, the Billy Paul classic was more or less our song. For those of you too young to know Me and Mrs. Jones, I can only offer my sympathy that you missed the very best time ever to be a teenager. I have hard evidence if you don't believe me. If you were too old to care about the soul revolution, like maybe Rassles' grampa, then maybe you should stop reading and start on that next angry letter to the editor.

Anyway, Mrs. Jones is like the sweetest woman you would ever want to meet. Elementary school teacher, right? Plus married to an artist, beautiful kids, loves Jesus, active in the community and beloved by friends and family alike. And a redhead, which is a thing with me. So the next morning, in what I'm sure was the spirit of playfulness and fun, and maybe a little because she remembers what an ass I was in grade ten, she commented that "ph" is always pronounced with the "f" sound, so there should really never be any confusion about words like "phonetic".

So did I "lol" or thank her for the info or point out how smart she was or even just ignore the comment? Oh. Hell. No. I fired back that she had really only shown that "phonetic" sounded like it was spelled, not the other way around. In public. Of course. Why? I suppose I can plead hangover or sleep deprivation as mitigating circumstances. But mostly it's because I'm an ass.