(I’m a preteen in this story. My friend and I are sitting in the basement chatting when my four-year-old brother comes tearing through at top speed.)

Me: “Hey, [Brother]. Where are you going so fast?”

Brother: “I’m getting a beer for Mommy! She needs it right away!”

(My friend stares at me, wide-eyed.)

Me: “She’s making dinner, I swear.”

Friend: “Okay, if you say so.”

(Fortunately, my friend stuck around for dinner, and greatly enjoyed my mom’s signature beer-braised chicken with barley and vegetables!)

(I am at the dentist’s for a general cleaning, with a hygienist I haven’t been with before. Things are going normally until this happens.)

Hygienist: “Oh, wow. Wow. This is really unusual.”

Me: “Is… Is something wrong?”

Hygienist: “Let me get the dentist. I have never seen this before.”

(By now, I am panicking in the chair a little. The hygienist leaves, then comes back with the dentist, and they both look into my mouth.)

Hygienist: “Look at her uvula. Isn’t it a weird shape? I’ve never seen that before.”

Dentist: “It just has a bit of an indent in the middle.”

Hygienist: “Her uvula looks so weird. I’ve never seen that before.”

Dentist: “All right, [Hygienist], you can go now. I can finish up this cleaning.”

(The dentist told me it was nothing to worry about and barely noticeable, then finished the cleaning without issue. No dentist or hygienist had ever told me I had a weird uvula before.)

(A friend is visiting from out of town and has forgotten to bring her contact lens container. I offer her two shot glasses, which we cover with plastic wrap and put in the medicine cabinet. In the morning, my roommate catches me before my friend awakens.)

Roommate: “What were those shots in the bathroom?”

Me: “They are my friends contacts.”

Roommate: “Oh, I wondered why it tasted awful.”

Me: “Wait, you drank her contact lens?!”

Roommate: “I didn’t know what they were! I didn’t know why you’d have two gross shots.”

Me: “You drank both of them?!”

Roommate: “I was confused!”

(Thankfully, the local eye doctor had my friend’s prescription in stock and my roommate bought her a box, so she could see. It was a little pricey, but we declared it an idiot tax.)

(This happens in a sixth-grade math class.)

Teacher: “Make sure you only combine like terms. Terms that are different are like apples and oranges. If you combine them, you end up with fruit salad instead of the answer.”

(I work as a waitress at a small, locally-owned restaurant that sells seven- and fifteen-inch subs. I am currently working at the register, taking a to-go order.)

Customer: “How big is your seven-inch sub?”

Me: *holding my hands about seven inches apart* “They’re about this big, ma’am.”

Customer: “Oh! Like a six-inch sub!”