Being tongue-tied happens to everyone. Whether you’re speaking to a large group of people or a close group of friends, you’re probably always in fear of being on the verge of slipping up and saying something ranging from mildly inappropriate to “WTF did I just say?!”
For me, I’ve just learned to accept that these moments occur fairly often. I guess I should have figured this out when I realized I first said the “bass” (as in the fish pronunciation) was really loud when driving with a group of friends in the car.
It was the beginning of the school year, and my roommates and I had finally moved into our new room in the sorority house. We were all really stressed out from all the recruitment activities we were participating in, and we needed a little break. My roommate Colleen suggested that we all go out to eat and have a little bit of roommate bonding. She said she knew of this really good, authentic Chinese restaurant we could go to.
Let me tell you, this may or may not have been the sketchiest Chinese restaurant ever.
In order to get to the restaurant, which is not accessible from the street, you have to go up this tiny set of stairs hidden between two stores.
“Um, are you leading us to some sort of gang initiation?” I cracked a smile as I ascended the dimly lit stairwell, but I was only half joking.
She assured me that it was “fine” and eventually the stairway opened up to a pretty awesome looking place with a view of the street.
I ordered potstickers under the impression that they would be identical to the over-Americanized Noodles and Company potstickers. Much to my dismay, these potstickers were nothing like the fake ones and had some unidentifiable meat. Ever since my trip to Turkey, where I’m pretty sure I accidently ate dog in a stew, I haven’t really been all that adventurous when it comes to mysterious meat products.
I looked over at my roommate Kendall’s plate. She had some kind of delicious-looking beef lo mein thing going on.
In other words, it was soon to be mine.
I should also explain that I have a really bad habit of abbreviating words that have no need to be abbreviated. “Probs, lolz, din” are just a few examples.
“Hey Kendall,” I asked, “can I have some of your noods?”
“Um, what did you just say?”
_Oh. My. Gosh. What did I just say?_
“Did you just ask for some of my nudes?”
Kendall looked terribly confused for about half of a second before she proceeded to almost pee her pants from laughing so hard and was soon joined by my other roommates.
Lesson learned: I always take a long awkward pause to fully run through what I’m about to say before I blurt out something awkward. Like, I don’t know, asking someone for their pornographic selfies.
