The Ginspiration prompt for this week is “crossed wires” which means a bunch of us bloggers are writing about the topic and then Lorna from GinAndLemonade will collate them in a round-up. Here’s my contribution.

I hate mornings.

I hate people Talking to me before my first cups of coffee – note the S on cups.

I hate it when people expect me to make sense in the morning or ask me anything deep and meaningful.

S knows this.

My dog knew it.

Most of the time my Mum knows it too, but nearly 4 years ago, in the time before s and I were a thing, she called me in the morning. Not really early, but I wasn’t up and my brain wasn’t working. I think it was a weekend.

It was because I’d asked her for some advice about a Christmas present I wanted to buy for S. We weren’t a thing yet, but I was hoping that would change, and in any event he had invited me for dinner, or a date, or something – I wasn’t really sure. In the end we ended up skipping the whole dating thing, and going from dinner to being together, but that’s a different story.

So I needed to get the present and make sure that it looked ok. I love internet shopping, but sometimes get a second opinion from someone with a functioning pair of eyes to check the picture online. And this is where my mum came in.

Me: so what do you think of the present for S?
Mum: Looks good.
Me: Ok, I’ll order it then. He’s invited me round for dinner, but I don’t suppose it’ll arrive in time for that. Never mind, it’s a Christmas present and it’s not yet Christmas.
Mum: did you tell A? (My friend who introduced me to S)
Me: no, not yet. I’ll do it later.
Mum: don’t you think she’ll mind?
Me: what, going out with him? I don’t suppose so, but it’s not really anything to do with her is it? We’re all adults!
Mum: but you can’t do things like that! She’s your friend!
Me: I don’t see why not. It’s not like I need permission is it? (Lack of coffee and exasperation beginning to set in).
Mum: but you’re going on a date with her boyfriend and you don’t think she’ll mind? ….

Oh dear!

The whole time I’d been talking about S, and she thought I meant my friend’s partner, whose name also begins with S, but even so – they don’t have the same name. Ok, I’d been talking about both of them and I don’t expect my mum to keep track of all my friends … it was a simple misunderstanding!

We had been talking about different people! My next problem was that I was laughing so much, I couldn’t explain the misunderstanding to her. Which of course made it worse because she just thought I was laughing at her and didn’t see what was so funny.

So the morals of this story are:

1. Names are important
2. Don’t ask me anything before I’ve had coffee and
3. If what someone is saying really doesn’t make sense, make sure you’re talking about the same thing!

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