While I'm new here, I'll freely admit to lurking frequently but primarily for the humor. I've found some of your comments incredibly hilarious. I only hope they were intended as such. One in particular from Nicole about some lady with triple nipples and the Nicole asks... "Is it sensitive?" Christ,... I was in tears for hours.

As the manager of a rather small division in a local multi-service utility, there are abundant opportunities to hear many hilarious stories from customers and new applicants alike. Generally speaking, it is not appropriate, nor is it profitable, in the long term, to laugh at customer complaints and questions. However, as a practical matter, it is simply a fundamental truth that at some point, each and every one of us will end up doing or saying something that triggers the human goofus alarm. Allow me, if you will, to offer the first and I pray it may provide some motivation for any of you to recall a funny instance of your own.

Our division is responsible for electrical service restoration during system disturbances and here in Florida, the summer brings ample opportunities for the service interruptions with the highest incidence of thunderstorms per year. During one particular brief but intense storm, all our linecrews had been retained or recalled but the outages simply outstripped our resources and the restoration began backing up and outage duration began to exceed two hours.

As we were beginning to move our most effective resources into those areas hardest hit, the dispatcher began waving the phone at me with some urgency. Answering the phone and expecting to hear my boss's voice ask for a progress report, the first words I hear are:

Customer: "What the hell is it with you people?"

Me: "Pardon me, sir... can I help you?"

Customer: "Yeah, buttwipe, you can get my g-- d--- lights on is what you can do!"

Me: We're trying sir... all our crews are currently assigned. What is your address?"

Customer: "You already know my address... your crews are leaving now and my lights are still off."

It was about here that I became aware of some distracting background noise and this was confirmed when Mr. Customer apparently turned to loudly address what was presumably his children. "I SAID TO KEEP IT DOWN IN HERE... Daddy's talking to an idiot so I gotta talk real slow."

Clearly spoiling for a fight, I was determined to deny him the satisfaction. Besides, I couldn't tell how big he might be.

Me: "Sir... we have a crew currently being reassigned and leaving Sandavol subdivision. Is that where you live?"

Customer: "Now you're getting it dumbass... and my lights are still off. Are you going to turn them around or do I gotta call to your boss and chew on his ass?"

Me: "If we have to, sir we will... have you checked the service panel breakers in your home?"

Customer: What kinda friggin fool do you take me for, mister. Turning again... "I thought I told you kids to shut the hell up... And turn that g-- d--- television off. RIGHT NOW!"

Me: Sir, did I understand you to say your television... Hello, Sir... Sir!... click!

-- Anonymous, December 15, 2000

Answers

Tis, that is pretty funny. My brother use to be an ER nurse. They kept a list of unusual names. The best was Shithead (pronounced Shi- ta, long a). The GI doctors I saw at a hospital clinic had last names of Drs. Butt and Bull, no shit. Back to the thread. My brother said a woman came in with a sick baby and told them the previous week her baby had been diagnosed with "smiling mighty Jesus". My brother said what? She repeated the phrase and he said OK, checked the chart, and got the proper diagnosis of spinal meningitis.

I used to perform clinical diagnostic lab work at a large prison. A lot of our patients were psychiatric patients. Once I was sitting on the floor, drawing blood out of the foot of some junkie. He looked down at me longingly and said, "my wife use to do that to me". I had a patient stop me in the hall to tell me that his blood was blue. I told him to tell his doctor. I was drawing a lithium level(used for manic depression)on this guy who knew words like hematoma (bruise) and seemed pretty intelligent. He started talking about his psychiatrist and asked if I had noticed he had something behind his ear. Knowing his psychiatrist, I thought maybe he had gotten a hearing aid. I told the guy no, I hadn't noticed anything and he informed me that it was a little tape recorder. I finished up pretty quickly after that and told him to hold pressure on his arm awhile so he wouldn't get another hematoma. The winner though, was a guy who enjoyed murdering women. He was very cooperative, having been restrained and I had four guards with me. But he told me to call him Jesus and wanted to make sure I knew what to do with his Holy blood. Stories about the staff are about as good.

-- Anonymous, December 17, 2000

I'm glad I can amuse you, Tis.

Well, I don't think I can compete with prison stories, but my last job was doing payroll for a temporary services office, except the people who worked through this office weren't temps, they were contract employees who worked for a multi-national wireless communications company. They were mostly engineers and programmers, making $20-$60 an hour. I've never had to deal with such social retards in my life. One man only wanted the office manager to deal with his payroll problems because he didn't want the "little people" in the office to know how much he makes, so he would call the manager, the manager would tell me the problem and I would fix it, I would tell the manager what I did to fix the problem, and she would call him back telling him that she did everything for him. One time I messed up and called him to ask him where he wanted his money sent (he was moving) and he called the manager and bitched her out for about a half hour.

Another man couldn't master the concept that if money is deposited in a bank after 2:00 pm, it wouldn't post in his account until the next afternoon. Countless times he would call me Thursday morning to tell me he didn't get paid, and countless times I had to tell him that his money gets direct deposited Wednesday afternoon so it won't show up in his account until Thursday afternoon. One time I think his head almost exploded when I had direct deposited money into his account on a Friday afternoon, and when he checked his balance Saturday afternoon it wasn't there. I then had to explain that banks don't work on the weekends. He still didn't believe me until I made him call his bank Monday afternoon and low and behold, his money was there.

I could go on, but I really don't want to relive that pathetic part of my life.

-- Anonymous, December 17, 2000

Speaking of unusual names, my best friend in high school had a summer job as an admissions clerk in our local hospital. One day a nurse in the emergency room was telling him the names of a woman's two children. She pronounced the names "Le-MAHN-jhe-lo" and "Or-AHN-jhe-lo". My friend tried to get spellings and found the nurse uncooperative, so he went to the ER himself and asked the woman how to spell her childrens' names.

Lemonjello and Orangejello. I swear to God.

-- Anonymous, December 17, 2000

Hi Paul,

Your story reminded me of my gym teacher in seventh grade, a man by the name of Dick Dauphin. Only he didn't care for our phonetic pronunciation of its name (and its closeness to "dolphin," I suppose) so he insisted on "Daw-PHANN." In illustrating the importance of proper accentuation (sp?) he too relayed the story of little Lemonjello and Orangejello. Only in his version, they were twin French exchange students who were in his class "many, many years ago." Heh.

-- Anonymous, December 17, 2000

A long time ago, I worked in a little moviehouse that showed foreign films exclusively. A question I got a lot, went like this: "Is this the new Bergman movie?" "Yes, it is." "Is it in Swedish?" "Yes, it is - it has subtitles." "What language are the subtitles in?" OR People would stare at the price board for the snacks, brow furrowed, breathing through their mouths and then ask, after long and thoughtful study, for items NOT listed on the board - "Do you have nachos?" "What about hot dogs?" I would always turn around, furrow MY brow, stare at the board and then after a long and thoughtful pause, say "I guess we DON'T have nachos." OR another bright inquiry was "What time does the 9:20 show start

-- Anonymous, December 17, 2000

I went to high school with a guy named Stormi Knight. I thought it was just a nickname and that it was spelled "stormy or stormie" unitl I happened it on his medical folder in phys ed one day. His sister's name was "Holly" which some people thought was funny, but I never did. I asked him one time why his parents named him Stormi...I mean was he born during a stormy night or something. He said: "Because they're sadists" and he wasn't amused. I thought it was kind of a cool name, like Dack Rambo or Matt Dillon. He didn't, apparently.

-- Anonymous, December 17, 2000

Oh no, Jennifer, I was hoping my friend's tale wasn't an urban legend. Actually, maybe it really did happen to him and that's how the whole story got started. I mean, it had to have started someplace. Anyway, he told me the story while employed there at the hospital in 1982 and I have retold it many times but this is the first time I have ever heard it from anyone else.

My former boss used to work with a guy named Dick Ressler (sometimes you have to say these names aloud to get the full impact).

And there used to be a guy at my office named Harry Chiu (pronounced "hairy chew"). My God, I can't even type that name with a straight face. What a cruel world. :-)

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

OK Paul W. I left out a couple of other names that my brother ran across in the ER, yep, you guessed it almost, Lemonjello and Limejello. Must be a cultural thing. Freak, why not Strawberry- Kiwijello?

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Strangely enough, my friend who worked in Vital Statistics in Richmond, VA in the early 90s SWEARS he saw the birth certificates for Lemonjello and Orangejello. He also saw a certificate for a man who changed his name from Bill Jones (or something simple like that), to Joybubble.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Yeah, I've heard the Lemonjello and Orangejello story from a couple of people here in Virginia also. My dad went to school with a girl named Cherry Teets. Her sister's name is Candy. What a cruel world...

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

I came across a name in my database at work that just sounds dirty to me: Rod Manifold. Hee hee.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Wow, what a trip about the Jello family, urban legends all! And I thought all these years that my best friend wouldn't have lied to me... :-)

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

When I worked for a real estate office in Omaha, we had a new tenant come in raving that the property manager had "seminized" his apartment before he moved in. He didn't even blush-he looked right at his female landlord and said: "You can't fool me, I'm a first born son. There is semen all over that apartment-you seminized it!". I was standing right next to her at the time and I totally lost it. I tried so hard not to laugh that I ended up snorting and ran to grab the owner of the company fast because I knew he'd never believe us unless he heard this man in person. This lunatic ranted for about 20 minutes about the tremendous amount of semen that we placed in his apartment during the 2 days between the time he viewed the apartment to when he picked up his keys. When we obviously did not take him seriously enough, he sued us. The word "seminized" was sprinkled all through the court documents.

We had numerous discussions on the correct pronunciation of seminized and seminization.

And the most unfortunate name I know belongs to my Aunt Cherry. Like she hasn't endured enough over the years, she recently married a man with the last name Sweat.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Kinda off topic from the original thread, but it fits in with all the "bad names"...

Has anyone heard the urban legend (I think) about those med students working in the delivery ward of the inner city hospital, who convinced a bunch of unfortunate women that Syphilis, Gonorrhea, Chlamydia, Propecia, and, in one particularly ridiculous case, Vagina would be beautiful and unique names for the new arrivals?

I really hope this isn't true but my mom insists it is. :)

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

A friend from high school swore to me she knew a girl whose name was Ima Hoar, but I didn't believe her at the time and still don't now. :) Also, in university, someone else claimed to know a girl whose name was Crystal Shanda Lear. I kind of want to believe that one.

I have work stories but I don't want to relive the horror so I'll just post on the name thing. :)

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Oh yes, we had a patient come into the county hospital once, a gentleman whose first name was Clitoris, I kid you not. I guess his mother thought the word had a melodious ring to it---I am guessing he went by Cleo or something. We just about died when we saw that on his chart.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Several years ago, Michael J. Fox was hosting Saturday Night Live. One sketch had him and someone else (Elle Cleghorne maybe?) as camp counselors for 'inner-city' kids. They were calling out names to make sure all the kids were on the bus before starting the field trip and the names were hysterical because they were all nouns that would never be real names. My absolute favorite was a kid named Spinabifida.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Heh. My sister dated a guy named Chris P. Bacon.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

One of my great-uncle's names is Gayus. His last name is Bald. His wife's name is Clysta. I love introducing my Uncle Gay and Auntie Clyt Bald.

You can't make this shit up, man. :)

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

Since this thread has degenerated ino funny stuff, here's a coupla definitions for you:

YUPPIE: young, urban, professional

DINK: dual income, no kids

WIFE: wash, iron, fuck, etc.

-- Anonymous, December 18, 2000

I used to know a guy in high school who's parents named him William Williams, a girl named Robin who married a guy whos last name was Hood, and when I was working sales I sold a garage door opener to a guy who's name on his credit card was Mr. Friendly. Which was his actual last name. I'm not making this up.

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

One of my brother's friends in highschool was Brick Wall (*not* a nickname). Quite appropriately, he was one of their star football players. I don't know what some of these parents were thinking.

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

a guy at works is named heysoos but he spells it jesus. weerd!

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

I had a teacher who once went to a West Texas family reunion- they were discussing a cousin who had legally changed his name (it was originally something like Cletus). They couldn't remember what it was- they knew it had something to do with car racing. Race Car? they thought. Then they remembered. Hot Rod. He changed his name to Hot Rod. I find that hysterically funny.

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

I seem to have blocked out my stories from dealing with bad check writers while working for Telecheck as a "Recovery Agent", and I have also blocked out the stories from working at Capitol Bail Bonds as a "Bonding Agent" :). But I do remember that we had a client at the bail bonds whose name is Baby Boy Martinez. Thing was that his mom couldn't decide on a name while in the hospital and the rules were (I guess) that everyone either baby boy or baby girl last name. Well, she liked that so much that she named his Baby Boy Martinez. Can you imagine what happened to him at the county jail? Yes, this is a cruel world.

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

Next time I'll edit for typos before I submit. :)

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

And why would you want to do that, Letty? No one else does.

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

A star player on my high school football team was Tiger Fox. I always thought that was a cool name. And yes, Tiger is his given first name and not a nickname.

-- Anonymous, December 19, 2000

Floosie-He pronounced his name Heysoos instead of English Jesus 'cause in Spanish, J's are pronounced like H's. I think that is right. Let me know if I'm wrong folks. Tis, thanks for starting this tread. I kind of took it on a tangential spin with the name thing, but it has been a fun thread!

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000

Many years ago, the company I worked for processed a lot of literature mailings from files submitted electronically. Invariably, we'd have modem problems, and somehow I got elected to field these calls. I got paged one day -- "Mary Ellen, Lasagna on Line One". Huh? I call the receptionist. "Is line one for me?" "Yes, Lasagna can't get in through the modem."

My office mates are rolling on the floor laughing at this point, but I pick up the call, and sure enough, the woman's name is Lazonia. I was always tempted to ask if she had any sisters, but never had the nerve.

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000

I once met a salesman with the name Ian Knight. I thought that was a cool name. I told him he missed his calling as an international man of mystery. "And vat is your name?" "Knight, Ian Knight." :)

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000

Strega Nona, my Sicilian grandmother, was named Facina Crucifixia Tardenico. Damn, that's a name.

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000

I knew a girl whose last name was Wolf, and she married a guy whose last name was Fox. She wasn't even *tempted* to hyphenate.

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000

thanx vicky!!!! i did'nt knwo that. i htought he was just cleering his throat!!!

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000

Lemonjello and Orangejello may or may not be real (though now that I'm in Richmond, I hear it more often), but Joybubbles definitely is. He lives in Minnesota. After growing up as a blind, abused orphan child, he decided to re-enter childhood as an adult and devote his life to making other kids, especially the abused and disabled ones, happy. If you read the Bulletin Board in the St. Paul Pioneer Press (their equivalent of this forum), he still contributes occasionally.

-- Anonymous, December 20, 2000