I Swear Like a Sailor

swearlogIn order to combat my all too common tendency to swear a blue streak, I have cemented a deal with Zoe and Zelda. For the next month, every time I curse, I owe them 5 cents (they were savvy enough to make sure we were talking $US coinage).

The catch is that they have to witness the swearing and they have to track it with their own log sheets that they design.

They embraced this task as if they were in hall monitor heaven! They were both very thorough about cataloging what constitutes a swear word. It turns out, this was important because they like to indicate which curse word I have uttered on their log sheets (I have no idea why). Happily, they only know four curse words: the a-word (ass), the s-word (shit), the f-word (well, that speaks for itself) and the b-word (bitch, which I only use as a substitute for “whine,” such as, “quit bitching about…”).

If you click on the photo above, you will see on their log sheets that I already owe them 10 cents, which was for the use of the f-word and the s-word. In all fairness, I said these two swear words yesterday when Zoe dropped a knife off of the stairs from the second floor that flew, point down, through the atrium, at an alarming rate of speed right past my ear, which was attached to my head on the first floor! I’m starting to wonder if she did it on purpose to provoke swearing… .

5 Responses to “I Swear Like a Sailor”

  1. meg

    oh, i do love the fact that you swear like a sailor! so do I…but i justify my horrible habit as I served in the Navy….so i come by it naturally!
    i love the fact that you are involving the kids in helping you kick the habit.
    ps..had some foot traffic thru the house…keep your fingers crossed…
    pps…do you want us to put some books in the mail for the girls…give us some series titles or books and we can put together a box.

  2. Michele

    Wow, I’m so jealous that you can actually claim to be a sailor to justify your cursing habit. I, alas, have absolutely no excuse for my foul mouth!

    Good news on the house! I’m so glad. Keep us posted.

    And your offer to send books is so very generous. Thus far, we have been able to find enough, and we have a whole new used English bookstore to try on our next run (thank you Dennis for letting us know about Walrus) — hopefully that will keep the girls in books for awhile!!

  3. Dennis

    You’re welcome. I look forward to hearing how that trip goes.

  4. melissa s.

    so do spanish swear words count? maybe you could sneak a few in in times of great swear-word need.

    so glad your head and ear are still attached!

  5. Michele

    Mel, you bring up an excellent point…and how delicious that you are giving advice on how to welch AND still swear all at the same time! Awesomeness.

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