Buzz Kill.
There are some dinner conversations that cannot be redeemed. We can only hope this doesn't happen at holiday dinners. One regular reader may be afraid of a segue into an example, like when a twelve year old climbs out on the roof because she was denied a wine glass for her cranberry juice at Thanksgiving dinner. But I'm not thinking in the large scope of absurd actions. Just labored, tense, sullen conversation.

There have been family dinners when I have been evasive in discussion of my day. Most of my work days leave me with some nugget than can add edification or humor to the gathering. Occasionally, the only interesting thing is something that I may not repeat. Or I would just prefer not to say.

"What did you do at work today, Mom?

"Nothing."

"Nothing? They pay you to do nothing? How about answering the phone?"

"I answered the phone."

""That can't be all?"

"Well, then I did some calculations and flipped through catalogs pricing a new pall for the parish. I'm OK with having some input into the pall that may very well be placed on my casket - maybe too interested - but it kinda "casts a pall" on the day. Yuk. Yuk. Yuk."

"That's all?"

"No, when I was done with that I worked on specs for a children's pall. FOR DEAD CHILDREN. IT HAS TO BE DONE - BUT EVEN IF YOUR ARE AS UNEMOTIONAL AS ME IT IS DISTURBING, OK?"

"Can we watch "The Simpsons" during dinner?

Tonight was not that bad. But I didn't win any happy homemaker awards for keeping the conversation lively. "What do guys think about Al Gore's chances of winning the Nobel Prize?"

I'm not someone who wants to burn Gore in effigy or reality. I do regard him as an earnest, ambitious none too suave snake oil salesman. And the lack of charm, to me, makes him more rather than less invidious. That makes me not-a-fan.

My more idealistic and 'green' (in the conservation sense) husband looked at me as though I had disparraged his mother. His post flu shot lethargy kept him from being too argumentative. He just looked annoyed. Moving right along...
"So who else do you think would be a likely winner?"

Each boy recused himself. Rick said Jimmy Carter. I said "puh-leez." Rick said Bill Clinton. I said Bono. Bono and Bob Geldoff. Bono, Bob Geldoff and the cast of "Wicked." Bono, Bob Geldoff, the cast of "Wicked," and Steve Jobs. Bono, Bob Geldoff, the cast of "Wicked," Steve Jobs and the inventor of the square bagel. Trying to turn the Nobel Peace Prize into a game along the lines of "I'm Going on a Vacation..." is not, this is a warning, not a good idea. Maybe we should have tried it "Telephone" style.

Then I became cranky. Rick was just hostile, but I was ready to drop the verbal gloves and tear into the subject. (I came from a family that considers dinner table argument to be an art form - Rick does not. The family into which I married does not consider debate to be a recreational sport. It is as well received as public defecation.) So I changed the subject to, "So just what has Clinton done." "Something with microloans." "But I thought last year's Peace Prize went to a microloan guy."

The boys had suffered enough. And it was almost time for The Office. So let's be excused.

And, gee whiz, folks...I make multiple microloans every week. Just wake me if there is a call from Stockholm. But not during The Office.