Fun Fact: My moms "grandma name" is Nani.
She is called Nani because when Lilo and Stitch first came out, a very young nephew was obsessed with the film. Little man didn't do a lot of talking, but he took one look at my mother (who is pear-shaped and bottom heavy in the best way) and shouted "Nani!"
Moms a sucker for a cute kid who is excited to see her, so the label stuck. She's been Nani for 20 years.
My dad LIVES for the moment when people ask why and he gets to talk about her butt - something he will honestly take any available opportunity to do. They've been together for 40 years and are still completely gross for each other and if my marriage ain't like that, then I don't want it.
Reddit user No-Hippo1283 asked:
"Parents of Reddit, what phrases do you still use that your kids 'invented' when they were young?"
Little kids inventing phrases and names for things and having the family just run with it is one of the best parts of having kids in the family!
Grandparent titles are just one way kids enrich the lexicon, but let's go ahead and start there since it's one of the most common.
What Do You Call Yours?
Abuelo Old Man GIF by CucoGiphy"Grandpa in Spanish is 'Abuelo' but my kid would always call my dad 'Olo.' "
"Thus we never refer to him as abuelo, only 'olo.' "
- ThatReaperGuy
"My mother would always greet my niece by saying 'Hello Darling.' "
"My niece couldn't pronounce darling, so she would reply to her 'Hello Wahwee' and then it sort of stuck. Now instead of Granny my mum gets 'Wahwee' by all the grandkids."
- _corbae_
"My grandpa has been 'Bumpa' for 20 years because one of my cousins couldn't pronounce grandpa right when he was like 3."
- 00zau
Drowsy
"My uncle says 'drowsy trousers' instead of 'pajama pants' because my little cousin was playing with rhymes and near-rhymes and came up with that phrase."
"He and I agree it sounds cooler."
- DBSeamZ
"Drowsy trousies 😉"
- beauxbeaux
A Moral Victory
Breakfast Burrito Cooking GIF by 60 Second DocsGiphy"All of my relatives refer to breakfast burritos as ‘eggy weggy tacos’ which is a moral victory for four-year-old me."
- Cw2e
"Same kind of thing here."
"A fried egg on a bagel in any form is an 'eggel bagel' and French toast with syrup is 'sticky froast' while the same with powdered sugar is 'poofy froast.' "
"So on Saturday morning a perfectly normal thing to say is 'do you want your froast sticky or poofy?' "
- Alt_aholic
"Reminds me of 'peeber meeshmof' in my family."
"When I met my wife I asked if she's ever had a 'peeber meeshmof' and she's like 'wtf??' "
"I realized then that 'peeber meeshmof' might not actually be the name of the amazing sandwich I love. So I called my mom."
"She says one of us, she can't remember who, said 'peeber meeshmof' instead of 'peanut butter and marshmallow fluff' and it stuck. Now that's just what we call them."
- Nokomis34
Some Foreign Country
"My young son tried to ask my dad for an English muffin, but couldn’t remember what they were called. He knew it was something about another country or foreign or whatever."
"So he called them 'China Buns.' "
"We still call them that today and he’s 18."
- Chairish
Tea Time
thrive love & hip hop GIF by Robert E BlackmonGiphy"My son, when he was little, commented that 'bathwater is just butt tea.' "
" 'Making butt tea' has meant taking a bath ever since."
- Dragoness42
"And I'm never going to take a bath again."
- Stoghra
Wanting A Poon
"I’m the child not the parent, but when I was learning to talk I used to say 'poon' instead of 'spoon.' My parents still use it to this day, saying sh*t like 'hand me a poon' or 'you want a poon for that?' "
"It never fails to make me uncomfortable because I know what 'poon' means these days but I’m not actually sure my parents do. & I’m not willing to correct them."
"They would absolutely mess with me about it if they realized, but they would be way more in my face about it if it they were actually doing it on purpose. Plus a family friend has made a joke about it & they just didn’t engage which they absolutely would have if they knew."
"They still joke about how I offered to help & 'cut the cheese' for a party when I was in elementary school, they are very obvious when they are messing with me, absolutely no subtlety."
"I really wish they knew & were f*cking with me so they would stop saying it around people that aren’t really close with us & probably think we’re all weird perverts when they hear it lmao"
"Plus, little do they know, I’m bisexual & do indeed want a poon."
- regular-kahuna
"My Nana asked the lovely young waitress at a cafe for 'a little poon please.' My husband and I nearly died laughing."
- LiquorishSunfish
Focus
"My brother was just learning how to sound out words and start to read. We were sitting in a McDonald’s eating when my dad points to a word up on the wall, and tells him to try and read it."
"He stared intently at it and slowly pronounced 'mac…nug…get!' "
"He was so focused, that he didn’t notice that he had tipped the little cup of ketchup he was holding and it had spilled all over his lap. So from then on, whenever anyone spilled food on their laps we say they 'pulled a McNugget.' ”
- WankSpanksoff
How You Become Jewish
K-Pop Daydream GIF by PENTAGONGiphy"When my son was in third grade near the Christmas holiday his teacher approached my wife (who volunteered at his school part time) and asked if we were Jewish."
"She replied no & was told that our son thought we were. When questioning my son why he told his teacher we were Jewish he said he wasn't paying attention when the teacher was going through the different religions asking the kids to raise their hands."
"So by the time he realized what was going on the only thing left was Jewish."
"Now our favorite saying anytime someone is not paying attention is 'That is how you become Jewish.' "
"His answer wouldn't have mattered anyway; he was raised Lutheran but we are not very religious."
- Driverwanted
Made Of Windows
"My son could never remember 'transparent' or 'see-through' so he called anything clear 'made of windows.' ”
"He wanted to put his puzzles in the box made of windows (Tupperware container), and wanted to drink out of the clear cup made from windows."
- sixthandelm
Let's Go The Other Way
"Going the opposite way, I sometimes use words my first-generation immigrant parents invented."
" 'Defrog' is what the button on the car dashboard with the wavy red lines does (defrost/thaw/de-fog?). And we sometimes got 'Kentucky Fried Kitchen.' "
- coilycat
"Haha, I do this with my immigrant parents too."
"My mom for some reason has trouble with the letter S at the beginning of words, and we still call smoothies 'moothies' to this day to poke fun at her."
- gentlemako
"I love this!"
"We do similar things in my house, since my husband is also an immigrant and non-native English speaker; he speaks 99.99% perfect, fluent English, but once in a while he'll just substitute the complete wrong word."
"My favorite was the time a jacked-up pickup truck passed us on the highway and he commented on its 'ridiculous suspenders' and it took me about 30 seconds to realize he meant suspension."
"But now all jacked-up trucks are 'suspender trucks,' obviously."
"He's also been known to accidentally switch languages when he's tired. I was beyond confused when he told me I'd look pretty with 'lint' in my hair."
"It took several minutes of synonym-charades to put together that he'd accidentally used the Afrikaans word (lint) rather than the English word (ribbon)."
"Cue recurring jokes about how we'd better save the dryer lint for wrapping Christmas presents, since it's so pretty."
- int3gr4te
Alright, now that you've gotten all of Reddits linguistic adorableness, it's your turn to share.
What words or phrases in your world exist thanks to kids?
Let's get our learn on, shall we?
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Reddit user New-Low5765 asked:
"People who work in the airline industry, what are some of the craziest things you have seen?"
Don't Drink And Tow Aircraft
"Worked as ground crew. 2nd day on the job we were issued a notice to gather."
"So when you check in every morning you’re supposed to always take a breathalyzer test to prove you can like you know, ride around the tarmack, use pushbacks on planes, etc..."
"For whatever reason this dude hadn’t taken it/got past without taking it."
"He was not sober."
"He was tasked with pulling a 370 [aircraft] into a hangar."
"He eyeballed it for whatever reason."
"So here we are watching a video of this absolute loon break the whole wing off while damaging the hangar in the process."
"Because he was drunk, insurance doesn’t kick in."
"We were promptly told that Christmas bonuses might be a bit smaller."
~ ProbablyChe
Occupational Hazard
"Someone had the tip of their finger cut off when closing the door to the plane and didn't say anything until the flight landed at the arrival gate and when the door was opened the chunk of finger fell out."
"The staff then said, 'Oh yeah, that's my finger. you can throw it away'."
"I guess he just bandaged and wrapped his own hand."
"It was about 1/4 of his finger including the nail that was cut off. The cutoff portion wasn't particularly bloody and it was really pale."
~ If_I_remember
"A plane I got on once almost left without half of its aircrew on it."
~ BeerisAwesome01
"'Let’s just go, they can meet us there'."
~ InformativePenguin
"Plot twist. That included the pilots."
~ Windyandbreezy
Excess Baggage
"Coffin with dead body inside being left off the flight due to overload without notice either to us or the family and the family realising it by seeing it while the plane was leaving and screaming to us."
~ elenivog
employee of the month ups GIFGiphyNoped Out
"Saw the pilot walk into the passenger area and say 'I'm not flying this piece of sh*t' and get off the plane."
"All the passengers followed him."
~ Jaded-Session8422
"Hell yeah, I'm following the pilot off the plane if something like this happens!"
~ lukaron
Giphy"I had something similar happen, but never got on the plane."
"It was sitting there seemingly ready but they never started boarding."
"Eventually the pilots walk off the plane and a few of us heard them say ‘This junk isn’t going anywhere’."
"Flight ended up getting cancelled a short time later."
~ potatocross
"I was threatened with [pilots walking out] multiple times a week as an aircraft dispatcher."
"Auxiliary power units (APUs) run the air conditioning (AC) in the aircraft and they were always broken down and not fixed quickly, so when the pilots show up it is hot as hell inside and there's no ground crew to connect the external AC."
"So I would get a call from the Captain telling me he is not going to fly this piece of shit because it is too hot."
"Then they'd go on a tirade about how bad the company sucks because they don't do maintenance."
"I would agree with them completely."
Giphy"Then by the end of the call they'd say they will take it but the company sucks and needs to fix the APU."
"Occasionally the captain would refuse it, but then the ground crew would hook up the AC and they would always get back inside and fly it."
"For sure there were issues that popped up where the AC had an unsolvable issue and it would result in a cancelled flight."
~ Winchery
"I’m Dallas-Fort Worth based. No APU/AC in November? Meh, whatever."
"No APU/AC in August in Texas?"
"I’m not going on that airplane. Ground just can’t keep up."
~ poser765
☣️ Bio-Hazard ☣️
"Flight diverted to my airport because a girl in hotpants got uncontrollable diarrhea from the laxatives she took before the flight to help get over her weekend binge in Vegas."
"She sh*t in her seat and down the aisle and all over the bathroom."
"Five other passengers had uncontrollable vomiting because of this and the panic on the plane from the crew and rest of passengers caused the plane to make an emergency landing."
"They ended up having to cancel the remaining leg of the flight to decontaminate the plane."
"Police were sent and interviewed her and her friends and no charges were filed. I don't know if the airline put her on any kind of no-fly list or tried to have her pay for damages."
~ If_I_remember
GiphyHighly Unsuccessful
"There were two suitcases checked in that were full of nothing but weed."
"The police arrested him in the gating area & confiscated the bags."
~ Traditional_Pair4840
"Something similar happened when I was a ramp rat back in the 1960s."
"Law enforcement was going to do the arrest at his destination."
"The weed disappeared before they got there."
~ endadaroad
Stealthiest Catch
"As a baggage handler I once had a shipment of live Alaskan crabs escape their container on the ramp."
"Flights were delayed."
"Turns out those guys scatter when they panic and try to hide under anything and everything."
~ Gregwaaah
"My significant other worked doing maintenance checks on commercial planes."
"This explains why they once found a bunch of dead crabs under the floorboards in the cargo bay. It was a mysterious mystery."
~ Highly_Referential
Avoiding A Strip Search?
"A fully naked woman just walked through the terminal and tried to walk through security like she wasn’t fully naked."
~ Commercial-Chance561
"She was just very considerately trying to make it easier for TSA."
~ TrooperJohn
"They make you take off your shoes but they don't say that's all you can take off."
~ smartguy05
Language Barrier
"I witnessed this in the security screening of a large American airport."
"And to be fair, there was a language barrier as the passenger in question seemed to be speaking mainly French, and struggling to understand the TSA agent's instructions in English."
"Female passenger (tall, attractive, and sophisticated-looking) was wearing a business suit with a pencil skirt and matching jacket, which was buttoned closed, going through security."
"The TSA agent told her she had to remove the jacket. She ignored and tried to go through anyway."
"He stopped her and told her again more loudly (that's when everyone started noticing)."
"She said no. He insisted. She refused again, and tried to walk through."
Giphy"He got angry."
"She tried to explain something but it was unclear because her English was poor."
"It went back and forth."
"They both started getting angry and frustrated. It started holding up the line and other passengers were getting agitated."
"A few people tried to intervene and explain more calmly that she needed to put her jacket through the x-ray machine."
"Finally, near tears, she blurted out 'fine' and removed her jacket, revealing that she was wearing nothing at all underneath, and walked through the screening machine topless."
~ SigmaSeal66
I'm a nervous flyer so it's not something I do often, but I still feel a little cheated that nothing this bizarre has happened while I was traveling.
Has something ever happened during your travels?
Share it in the comments.
A good friend is not always the one with whom you share laughs and fun experiences.
The friendships you want to keep include those who won't abandon you in a time of need or someone who supports you in a variety of complicated situations where not even a family member can be relied upon.
Unfortunately, many of us have experienced a time when a person's true colors revealed to us that the so-called "friend" we've always trusted wasn't one at all.
Curious to hear examples of this, Redditor Aesthetik_1 asked:
"What made you instantly realize This 'friend' is not a real friend?"
These Redditors didn't realized at the time that they were being used.
Recurring Favor
"When he only called me when he needed something. It didn't hit me until much later."
– Queasy-Location-9303
"I have one of those 'friends'. She always gushes about how we're friends but she never initiates contact unless she wants me to do something for her."
– StiffAssedBrit
The Errand Girl
"Several years back, I had a friend who introduced me to this new boy she was seeing. Maybe a year later, their relationship blew up in a fury of bs (whole other story), but by the time they split, I was equally friends with both of them. He and I were both photographers at the time, so the friendship was instantaneous."
"One day we started talking about her, neither positively nor in poor taste, just kind of in general."
"He then asked me 'when she texts to hang out, what does she usually want to do?'"
"I paused. I thought. Holy sh*t, she'd either be asking for a favour or for help with some kind of errand. I was her f'king errand girl."
"She texted me a month or two later, just a 'hey'. I never responded. She never texted again."
"I'm still friends with her ex, though. That dude is genuine as heck."
– ChamomileBrownies
Testing The Friendship
"When you decide to let them be the one to reach out. And you never hear from them again."
– plzdontgetmad
"Yup. Made plans with a friend three times, she cancelled each time. I finally told her to let me know when she was free, we haven’t hung out since."
"She was a good friend for the season, but not a lifetime."
– NoMrBond3
People were shocked to discover the moment they realized they didn't really know who their "friend" was anymore.
The Chaperon
"I had been giving rides to a girl I thought was my friend. To and from school in high school. She wasn’t really suppose to ride with other teens but due to her mothers work hours we could easily pull this off. I thought we were close."
"One day while on the way home my brakes went out. We were about 2 blocks from her gated neighborhood. I managed to roll in safely and parked at her house to call a tow truck."
"She flipped. Told me I couldn’t stay. She knew my brakes were not working as she had also been terrified when we couldn’t stop. She said she wanted to go to a movie that weekend with other friends and her mom would ground her if she saw me at the house. I offered to lie and say I only stopped there as my car malfunctioned on my way home. I had to pass her neighborhood on my way home anyways."
"She refused. Started to scream at me. She didn’t care what happened I had to go. Started to call the guard at the front gate to tell them I had broken in and was threatening her."
"I left her and that friendship that moment. I managed to roll my car slowly to a mechanic not too far away but never forgot the shi* feeling of knowing I could have been seriously hurt and she wouldn’t have cared. She wanted to see a movie. She had the nerve to sheepishly call and ask me a couple days later if I could give her a ride to school. Told her I was too busy and no longer had time… after all I wanted to help her obey her mom's rules. She rode the bus til she graduated."
– Duffarum
Unwilling Companion
"I had this friend in school. Each year there was a funfair in our city, all students received vouchers for a drink and something to eat. This friend complained the whole day that she had no one to accompany her to the funfair. So, stupid me offered to go with her."
"Once we arrived we met another friend of hers. And another, and another... until we were a group of 5 or 6 people. I didn't know anyone and was basically just walking behind them. This friend took me aside and said, 'My friends think you are annoying, and we would like you to leave.'"
"It was a pleasure to see that she failed her exams a year later."
– Auldale
There's the spirit of competition, but when it's taken seriously, we're no longer game for these friendships.
I Can Do It Better
"Constantly 'one ups' me. A real friend is happy for you."
– Complex-Half8338
"That one time I got a fake bag but she doesn’t know and then 2 weeks later messaged me that she also bought a luxury bag… Then when I got a bf, she also went to get a bf within 3 months which is TOTALLY fine but she constantly messages me for us to go on a double date. Anyways, sadly they didn’t last long :( I mentioned that I wanted to go to Cuba, she went ahead and bought herself a ticket to Cuba but I didn’t end up going lol"
– Hot-Coffee-8465
Never Steal The Spotlight
"When they loved the idea of me shining, but behind their shadow, I could never do or achieve anything above them, and when I did, they would get jealous."
– Jasssin23
"Yes! I recently ghosted a friend because of this kind of behavior. She was trying to compete about EVERYTHING. Like she bragged about how her mom’s car accident was more traumatic than my elderly MIL’s - which is not even an appropriate thing to compare. She would also try to 'outshine' celebrations of my milestones and was mean to several of my friends for no apparent reason. She was a loose cannon at best."
– thefifthtrilogy
All About Me
"ALL she talks about it herself and her problems. Granted she has a a lot but never asks about me or my life until she realizes she just bypassed my attempt to want to talk about something in my life bothering me and continued to talk about herself."
– PokemomOnTheGo
People can just be so rude.
"When I got really sick. Very few came to help."
– Tofflus1
"Same here. I got cancer and everyone I knew was over the top supportive for the first six months and then all but three of my friends just vanished. I saw one of them at a Halloween party while I was going through chemo and she told me that my bald head made people uncomfortable. I was dressed as Captain Picard, it was awesome and she ruined it."
– CatGoNoTail
Not Missing High School
"At lunch, she was sitting with her boyfriend, I was sitting with our friend circle. She came up to me, guilted me into sitting with her and her boyfriend, and then proceeded to ignore me for the rest of lunch."
"She didn't care about me, she just didn't want me talking to the friend circle that she had abandoned for her boyfriend. When I pointed this out to her, she called me a jealous b*tch."
"Ah, high school. How I don't miss thee."
– Symnestra
These examples actually served as a good reminder for me to take a moment and assess my friendships.
Not so much about how I've been treated but more about checking myself to see if I'm respecting the people I call my friends.
We've all been guilty of casually mentioning future plans to get together. I embarrassingly wait for people to initiate something, which is terrible.
Show up for your friends. Make them feel important like the individuals they are.