OOPS!

First, a brief word from our sponsor:

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Now, on to today's topic:

Klutz is defined as either a clumsy, awkward person, or a blockhead. I'd rather think of it as clumsy, since I sometimes consider myself a klutz; unfortunately, I also read that klutz originates from the Yiddish word "klots" which means "wooden beam." Hmm. Like a block. Head.

I may be clumsy, but I'm no wooden beam.


I'm not the constant klutz. I have moments of great dexterity. I spent some time dancing, from ballet to Lindy Hop, I've got a good riding seat, and I can embroider, so I clearly have motor skills.


Sometimes not all the pistons are firing, though.


Like the day I tossed the Tide Detergent ball into the washer, where it careened off the sides of the tub and caused some kind of physical law to be enacted, whereby all of the oozing liquid in the ball shot straight up in the air, landing on my head. The lessons here were: 1) drop the ball in, don't throw it; and 2) Tide is not a good shampoo.

Today was another of those days. It began with my deodorant and without my glasses. I got my new deodorant out of the medicine cabinet and opened the lid. There was a seal on the new container.


Without my glasses, I am marginally sighted, but the arrows were clear enough, and they pointed toward an edge, so I spent five minutes and two fingernails trying to pry the plastic off the indicated end. After a bit, I looked at the seal and saw a big black line on the opposite end and something blurry in the middle. I reached toward the line; the seal was loose on this end and the whole thing pulled off like buttah.




Apparently, the arrows were directing me to pull in their direction. Who knew?

But wait, there's more. I started turning the knob to get the gel up out of the container. I turned and I turned and I turned, but nothing was happening. Have you ever gotten so involved with the process that you forgot to look at the results? I kept turning the knob and looking at the stick in the middle without watching the top. Eventually, I looked up to see a good quarter-inch of standing goo coming out, slowly bending to the side. It was clear. It was fragrant. It was way too much goo.

A smart chickie would wipe the top with a tissue and begin again. A cheap chickie would try to dab the goo at her armpits and try not to get too slimy. Guess what I tried? There is, by the way, no efficient way to apply a mound of goo to your armpit without getting slimy. The goo dried, so I'm just a little sticky now, in a residual kind of way, much the way I felt residually klutzy for the rest of the day.

It's not much of an incident, but it got me to thinking about the characters we create who are clumsy. The cliché is that they are clumsy but endearing – how many characters are clumsy and annoying? Lucy (of I Love Lucy) is the first person who pops into my head at the endearing end of the spectrum, and Inspector Clouseau is at the annoying end. In between are people like Chevy Chase in his SNL days, Laurel and Hardy, and Buster Keaton.

Who are your favorite klutzes, real or fictional? Do you like them because they're endearing, or annoying?