I’m an intern at a nuclear power plant. The group I’m with is about to start some work.

Group Leader: “All right, guys! Let’s go make history!”

Group Member: “Uh… no. That’s the opposite of what we want to do.”

We used to live in an apartment with a balcony facing the street. There was a unit next to us, so their balcony was a few feet down from us along the side of the building, facing the same direction. It was a busy street and that was our only “outside area,” so my boyfriend and I liked to spend time out there, and we noticed that our neighbor had some odd habits.

He would put up tall pieces of plywood on the side of his balcony when he was out there, facing toward our balcony only, not toward the street. Despite this, it was easy to see that he would sit outdoors, shirtless and only wearing tighty-whity style underwear, and rub his bald head while watching the foot traffic and cars below.

It seemed harmless enough — we could always see his hands, at least — so what did we care? 

Our big ginger cat loved going out on the balcony and would sit for hours on the railing and watch the birds. One day, I had the sliding door open to let the cat in and out as he pleased and not play butler every five minutes. I saw that the cat was sitting on my boyfriend’s grill. It was closed, but it still was probably not the most hygienic place for a giant cat. 

I poked my head through the open screen door and told him sternly, “Get your butt off of there!”

I had barely noticed that the next-door side partition was up and our neighbor must have been enjoying a head rubbing session because, the next thing I knew, there was a half-naked-and-tighty-whity blur visible in the gap between the door and the makeshift partition, diving headfirst into his apartment at my remark!

Thankfully, his apartment’s access was on the opposite side of the building and we never ran into him other than on the balcony, but we’d glimpse him in the parking lot occasionally, always in a very straight-laced banker-type suit!

My dad owns a small demolition business and I work for him. We tear down old houses or remove the interior for remodels. There is one employee we call Lucky because he suffers some minor but unfortunate accident at every site he works at, like having a chunk of drywall fall on him or a piece of wire scratch his face. Lucky, two other coworkers, and I are sent to tear down a trailer that is not safe to live in or move. As we do our walk-through:

Me: “Okay, everyone, be careful; the floor does not look sturdy.”

Coworker #1: “I bet lunch that Lucky goes through within three hours.”

Coworker #2: “One hour.”

Lucky: “Not funny, guys!”

Me: “The next thirty minutes.”

Lucky: “Okay, first to fall through pays for lunch for a month.”

Us: “Deal!”

As I’m entering the kitchen:

Me: “Something happens to you at every site. At least this time we—”

The floor rips like paper as my leg goes through it.

Lucky: “Wooo! Lunch on the boss’s son!”

I had some bruising around my thigh and an even bigger bruise on my ego. Lucky made it through the job without a single accident, and I paid out big time for lunch that month.

Many years ago, when I am still in my single digits, I get a small RC helicopter for Christmas from Santa Claus. Unbeknownst to me, my dad bought it mostly for himself; he just slapped my name on it to avoid my mom’s disapproval.

On his first day back to work after his Christmas vacation time, he brings the mini copter with him. My dad works in an office with cubicles so there’s plenty of open air for him to mess with, and he and his coworkers are having a blast with the thing, when, suddenly…

Boss: “WHOSE TOY IS THAT?”

Dad: “Uh, mine?”

My dad has been sitting down the entire time so he didn’t notice when his boss walked in, and [Boss] couldn’t see who had the remote.

Boss: “[DAD], IS THAT YOU?”

Dad: “Yes, sir!”

Boss: “CAN I PLAY WITH IT? PLEASE?”

Needless to say, not much work got done that day! And my dad’s boss kindly asked him to never bring the copter in again.

In university, my minor is in Translation. At the start of the first seminar of one of the courses, the teacher has us fill out a questionnaire. Some of the questions are straightforward and their purpose is clear, like, “Why are you interested in translation?” or, “What are your source and target languages?” (These are, respectively, the language you’ll be translating from and the one you’ll be translating into — in my case, English and Dutch.)

Other questions are less straightforward, like, “What is your favorite word in your source language?” (For the record, it’s “defenestrate”.) And then there’s this question:

Question: “Which words from your source language do you think native speakers would find hard to spell?”

Um… what? How am I supposed to know what words native English speakers find hard to spell, not being a native speaker of English myself? I ponder this question a bit, and all I can come up with is “knowledge” because it is spelled differently from its pronunciation, but again, I don’t know! The questionnaire is asking for multiple words, though, so I continue thinking, but I’m stuck.

All that’s going through my mind is the commercial I saw right before I went to class, for “Mary Poppins,” the musical. I start tapping along to “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” trying to think of difficult English words. And then it hits me. THAT is a word that would be difficult to spell! Feeling a little mischievous, thoroughly done with this weird question, and also wondering what my teacher will make of it, I write Mary Poppins’ magical word down and hand in my questionnaire.

At the next seminar, the teacher returns our questionnaires with feedback. Next to my musically inspired answer is a question mark.

Teacher: “If you have any questions about my feedback, please ask them now.”

Me: “I have one, ma’am. What does this question mark next to question fourteen mean?”

Teacher: “Oh, yes, that. You know, you weren’t supposed to make up words for that question, [My Name].”

I’m puzzled that the teacher, who has kids, is apparently unfamiliar with this movie.

Me: “I didn’t? It’s from Mary Poppins.”

Before the teacher can respond, one of my classmates groans.

Classmate #1: “Did you seriously write down ‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’?”

Me: “Yep!”

Now the teacher is the puzzled one.

Teacher: “This is really a word?”

Classmate #2: “It’s a song, ma’am.” *Starts singing* “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious…”

I and several other classmates fall in and sing the chorus and others start laughing and clapping along, until most of the class ends up singing,

Class: “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!”

We’re all laughing, while the teacher is looking at us like we’ve all turned purple.

Teacher: *Bewildered* “Okay, I guess it’s a word. You can ignore that question mark, [My Name].”