My Hearing Isn't Always 20/20

June 14th, 2010

As I entered the grocery store this evening there was someone leaving the store that I have probably known for 20 years but most likely haven't seen in 20 months. It was late, almost closing time and she was with two younger people, so we had a brief intense, in-motion interspersed "Hi How Ya Doin' ? Fine" face-to-face-fast-paced-fleeting-greeting-phrase-fest as she walked past, as I was attempting to decide which basket to use. 

Just as she was a step behind my ear and out of eye sight I heard her say a final, "something something Wi-Fi" to me ...

- and -

my confused mind suddenly thought, "Why would this particular woman, be interested in my wireless Internet connection, she isn't in that business, well, at ... least I didn't think she was (?) " - so I repeated "Wi-Fi" progressively slower in my head three times, and the slowest time I heard the words "Wife Hi" - and I cracked up laughing, realizing that she most likely had said, "Tell your wife hi for me". 

I turned around and caught up to her in slightly more than 20 feet and a lot less than 20 seconds since the opening paragraph of this story, right outside the store and told her my Wi-Fi mental missed-understanding and she cracked up laughing as well. Then she said clearly and humorously slow with her hands kind of block forming letters in mid-air, along with a strange impromptu emphatic sign language, "TELL TAMIE HI FOR ME !!!"

So just as my residential N-Class wireless SOHO router reception isn't always reliable, my just so-so hearing isn't always 20/20 either, with things spoken in a slow southern Texas tongue tumble getting jumbled in the ether, bits and pieces twisting twang-ling in the breeze.