Pretty Close to a Perfect FHE

Last night we had FHE-Part 1. We've split it for the last decade or so because we never had time for everything on Monday night and the kids always complained there was nothing to do on Sundays. Anyway, Craig gave a really good lesson based on a talk from Elder Eyring. This was his home teaching message for the month, but before that we had General Meeting. GM is when we go around the family and each person tells what they have going on that week, asks questions, and beefs about whatever is bothering them. The last item used to make up the bulk of GM, but now the kids are older and they get along well so we don't get too much of that. Last night we kept getting side-tracked onto funny things that had nothing to do with what we had been talking about. We had a really great conversation with the kids, something we don't do often enough. Then Tom made a clever joke, which the kids laughed at. I commented, "If I had made that joke, no one would have laughed. You only laughed because it was Dad's joke." This made the kids laugh again because it's true. (I'm the Rodney Dangerfield in our family. I don't get no respect.) The incident reminded me of when Craig was 4 or 5. He used to tell knock-knock jokes that he made up as he went along so the punchline didn't make any sense. Tom and I would laugh because it was funny that he was trying to be funny. Abby would get all indignant and start yelling, "That's not even a joke. It's not funny. Stop laughing. If you laugh he'll think it's funny and it's not!" Craig doesn't remember any of this, but thought it was hilarious. Later he called Abby. Here's how the conversation went.

C: Knock-knock.
A: Who's there?
C: Train.
A: Train who?
C: Train fell in the mixing bowl.
A: Train fell in the mixing bowl? I don't get it. What does that mean? What am I missing? Am I supposed to get this? Train-fell-in-the-mixing-bowl...I don't get it.
C: Why don't you ask someone else to explain it. (There was a party going on at their apartment.)
Finally I had mercy and yelled, "Think 4-year-old. "
A: Is this one of those jokes like you used to tell when you were four? That's what I thought at first, but I wasn't sure.

We were laughing pretty hard by now. When I talked to Abby today and reminded her how she used to get so mad she said, "I did? Ellen got mad too, didn't she?" Good times and good memories!

Another funny thing that came out during our conversation also came from Craig. They had a combined YM/YW class on Sunday and various people who had served missions spoke to them. Craig was pretty excited because he had learned a couple of new words from one of the men. Brother Thomas, who is now a corporate lawyer with a wife and two kids, told them that in high school he was a total geek and "had no game", but after his mission he had "lots of game" and didn't have any trouble with the girls. Craig loved the phrase, but then said, "For some reason whenever he talked about being a geek in high school he looked right at me."