Excuses, Excuses.

Hello. Welcome to the influential Weekend Gene Pool, containing the DNA of all human experience. Here is where we ask you for your personal anecdotes on a particular subject, and promise you that we will entertain you in return.

Merry Christukkahzaa season. As we all know, this is the season of joy, generosity, and excuses — excuses for not attending parties we don’t want to attend, for forgetting gifts, for not returning Christmas cards, for getting caught regifting, for not eating someone’s famous terrible Christmas cookies, not taking the kids to The Nutcracker and thus such. Sometimes, the excuses are made up. Sometimes, they are real, but bizarre, such as this one I received during the last Gene Pool, and which gave me the idea for this contest.

My parents arrive tonight. My husband does enjoy my parents’ company in small doses, but a week of them is a bit much for his tolerance. However, he gets a temporary reprieve because he actually has somewhere to be tonight when they are scheduled to arrive. A holiday party? no. Bar trivia with the guys? no. Some sporting event? no. No, I believe he's found the most absurd excuse to avoid an evening with my parents in the history of ever. Our pastor has asked him to come over with his night vision and .22 to dispatch an armadillo that is tearing up their property. So, he's scheduled himself to be at their house this evening from dark until whenever the darn thing is properly dispatched. Has anyone’s spouse ever had a more absurd excuse to avoid their in-laws? I may be the first one to text their parents their following, “It’ll be just us for dinner tonight as Lee will be killing armadillos at the pastor’s house.” Mom thinks I MUST be joking. I am not. This is really what he's doing and I was sitting there in Bible study listening as they arranged it last night and even saw the video of the darn armadillo tearing up their yard.

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A personal note: I once was set to star in a fourth-grade play, “When Boots Befooled the King.” I played Boots! But at the last minute I came down with German measles. My ma said I couldn’t perform. I whined and begged but secretly was glad because I was terrified I would have blown it. My Aunt Ethel, who was a high school teacher, called my school, and the person she spoke with was kinda alarmed and unsympathetic — I was the star! — and hinted that German measles wasn’t so bad, and maybe, y’know, I could tough it out, and …. and Ethel interrupted and cooed, “Okay, fine, he’ll be there, the show must go on, and I hope there are no pregnant women in the audience, but you know best,” and hung up. Then she smiled at me, and looked at the phone, and it rang….

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So that’s the question for today: Unusual Excuses. There are two categories: (1) Excuses you or someone you know once gave, whether true or phony. And, (2) Excuses you make up that are funny. These are not limited to Christmastime. They can be about anything. You can, in fact, give an excuse for not becoming a paid subscriber to The Gene Pool.

Send them here, to our famous orange excuse button:

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And finally, today’s Gene Pool Gene Poll.