Mrs umm.. Mum?

I was talking to my mum a few weeks ago about when I was little, and learning to read and write. I was about four or five years old, and after learning my name, we were told to learn our parents. I was completely stumped. I remember going home and listening very very hard to them talk, to see if I could work out what they were called, other than "mummy" and "daddy".

Of couse, my mum laughed at me hearing this story, because it's both cute, and a little stupid.

If only it ended there.

I'm just filling out an order form online, to send flowers to my grandmother for her birthday, and got completely stumped on her name. I can't remember if it ends in an 'A' or an 'E'. (Sort of like Clare vs Clara, but that's not her name.)

I don't think I should fill it in to Mrs Grandmother Borgfamily.
I'm such a terrible grandaughter!!!

Anyone else had issues like this ever?

I don't know my parents street address. I have a general idea, but after it changed from a route and box number, I didn't keep up with it.

I've always near them so it was an issue.

My grandmother and her sister each married men with similar last names - essentially the same name with and without an "e" on the end. Led to a lot of confusion around Christmas cards and thank-you notes.

Then there's the fact that my mother's brother and my father's brother married sisters, which means my cousins and I are interrelated on both sides, and oh, is that difficult to explain to people...

Double-cousins!

It didn't help that Dad had a bunch of pet names for Mom. God knows how old I was before I realized her name was Gladys, not "Bubbles," "Doll," or "Happy Bottom*."

*(Gladys = Glad Ass = Happy Bottom )

I once called a girlfriend by the wrong name.


I won't do that again.

At least not to HER.

Not long after I started senior school, I was talking to my gran about what a terrible name one of new friends was saddled with, and when I finally got round to saying what it was, there was a bit of a silence, then gran said, 'That's my middle name...'

I never really had that problem because both sets of grandparents called my parents by their given names. But what was really funny was that my maternal grandfather had nicknames for all of us, from my mom down to my youngest cousin.....even one of his dogs had a nickname.