the toenail An Important Part Of The Whole

I am thankful for…

…spoonerisms, and the entertainment they provide my family.

Long before I ever knew that there was an actual name for it, this impediment had taken on the descriptor “verySherry”, as in, that is verySherry.  I can’t help it!  Those who know me also know my rapidly firing mind that sometimes processes and questions so quickly, my poor mouth just can’t keep up!  That’s how we get things like, “Did you log the dets out?”, or “Put on your jed racket”, or “I thought we’d have reas and pice for supper”.  The thing is, they come so fast and furious (and unexpected) that most people within earshot don’t catch the slip ups instantly.  Boy, has this kept my family and friends laughing over the years.

Imagine our delight when, several years ago, we discovered the book, Runny Babbit by Shel Silverstein.  This entire book is dedicated to spoonerisms and it is a barrel of laughs.  There have been other books that we really enjoyed by Shel, like The Giving Tree (Favorite!!!) and The Missing Piece, but Runny Babbit holds a special place in our literary collection.  This probably has something to do with why my kids see me as “talented” instead of “misspoken”.

Just the other night, sitting around the backyard fire pit, our family yucked it up, spouting off silly spoonerisms, trying to top the one that was said before.  We came up with some good ones, like

Licken Chips  (Chicken Lips)
Sped Bread  (Bed Spread)
Naghetti Spoodles (Spaghett…..oh, you get it now!)
Cog Dollar
Stean Balk
Bigs in a Planket

We were laughing so loud, I was certain our neighbors were going to start flashing their porch lights or telling us to pipe down.  Good, clean fun.  Well, mostly.  There are a few things you should never mix up when it comes to this type of entertainment, but I’ll leave that to your imagination.  In a family filled to the brim with young men (including my husband here, I’m in need of prownie boints), it wasn’t a stretch to come up with some sketchy combinations.  But, we always come back to chicken.  Chicken is probably the funniest word to use when you’re honing your talent.  We have laughed a ton over things like Chicken Nuggets and Chicken Fingers.  Thinking of KFC, the winner of our night’s competition around the fire was the following:

Chicken Littles and Chicken Dippers

Go on.  Give it a try.
It will surely be easier to spit out reading it, instead of pulling it from memory.

You know you want to, so just do it.

Out loud.

No one’s listening.

Just switch the first sounds of each word in the pair.

You can do it.

And then, enjoy the laugh.

Licken Chittles and Dicken Chippers

Isn’t that hilarious?

Heavenly Father, yes!  I am thankful for laughter.  I have no doubt that you have a sense of humor, too, sometimes.  Thank you for my boys and my husband, with whom I love to spend time with in laughter.  All good things come from you, Lord, and I’ve no doubt that the authorship of our good fun around the campfire the other night, was penned from your hand.  Thank you, Lord!  Amen.