Friday Family History: Someday We'll All Laugh at This

I recently made a doozy of a mistake--the kind of mistake that fills up the "All in a Day's Work" section of the Reader's Digest; the kind of mistake that we all smugly laugh about because we would never do something so stupid; the kind of mistake that becomes a legendary family tale, to be retold and passed down through the ages. 

And no, I'm not going to tell you just yet.  First, I want to tell you another funny story:

The Day My Husband Met My Parents

I met John at Brigham Young University, and we quickly fell in love and decided to get married.  As BYU is 800+ miles from my hometown, my parents did not meet John until the week before our wedding.

After driving for many hours from Utah, we arrived at my parents' house.  It is nestled into a hill in the countryside, surrounded by beautiful trees and wildlife.  Greenhouses attach to the front of the house, with sliding glass doors providing access to the living quarters.  The greenhouses have vents to provide needed ventilation and cooling.

My parents and siblings excitedly greeted us as we pulled up to the house.  We all went inside, and John started answering questions.  The first words out of my brother's mouth were, "Are you going to get a dog?  Kristi loves dogs."  Sometime in the midst of the conversation--swoop, swoop--a bat flew by, seemingly out of nowhere.  Up jumped my dad and John, and they spent the next little while shooing the errant creature back to the great outdoors. 

Afterwards, my mom explained to her future son-in-law that we had never before had a bat come into the house.  (Presumably it came in through the vents in the greenhouse.)  My dad was impressed with John's good-natured, solve-the-problem demeanor.  If John wondered at all about what he was getting into by marrying me, he didn't let on. 

Fortunately, he still takes life with me in stride. 

Yesterday, John asked me to please check his personal e-mail box, and forward an expected message to his work e-mail address.  I dutifully agreed.  I even changed the subject line, as the particular e-mail contained a new job offer, and John had not given notice to his current boss yet.  Forgetting that I was signed in to his account, I forwarded the e-mail to john._______@______.com.  As soon as I hit "send," I received confirmation:  "Message sent to John _______."  The only problem was, the last name displayed was not my husband's last name! 

In tears, I quickly called my husband and announced, "I did something really bad!" 

"What did you do?" 

"I sent the e-mail to the wrong John!"

"Which John did you send it to?" 

"John ______" 

"Oh, my boss.  It's OK.  Don't worry."  I was glad he seemed so non-plussed, but I was still crying when I hung up.

A little while later I got an e-mail:

Kristi,

If you knew John ________, you’d know that everything will be just fine. I just sent him an e-mail that said:

-----------------------------

John,

I would like a few minutes to talk with you as soon as you get a chance.

A little while ago, my wife forwarded you an e-mail from my home account (oops). Hopefully you haven’t opened it yet. If you haven’t, please don’t open it. If you have, then you can probably guess what I want to talk about.

Thanks,

John

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So, the only risks are:

)      He finds out about my news a few minutes earlier than I intended

2     He has a funny story to tell his wife when he gets home

3     He thinks you love him (depending on what you wrote)

All is well,

Love,

John

As it turned out, John the boss was in meetings all day and didn't even see the e-mail, so my husband was able to be the one to break the news to him. 

And I've got a new tale to add to my collection of "Stupid Things I've Done While Trying to Be Helpful" stories.

How about you?  Any funny stories that didn't seem so funny at the time? 

Thanks to John, the most patient, wonderful husband ever.