Absurd: Another tale in the ever-amusing chronicle of my sister and her extremely dysfunctional life

In college, my sophomore year roommate declared one day that hubby (then just boyfriend, of course) were a good match because we had very similar and very warped senses of humor. Indeed, we tend to be extremely compatible in that area: there are things we find very amusing that no one else does.

My sense of humor takes an even more warped turn within my immediate family. Just as most sets of siblings have inside jokes and such, so do we. At the rare times the three of us have been together and degenerated into our own unique humor, even my husband looks at us oddly, not laughing, not getting it. But accepting.

It appears that my sister's husband still has not accepted this part of having married into the family; he still does not accept this. My sister and her husband have been married for almost 27 years. I think it's about time.

You see, for Christmas, there is always at least one gag gift given to each sibling. For several years, my sister and I were sending one another the cheesiest, most God-awful kokopelli gifts we could must. I'm talking so bad that the sequined kokopelli shirt with "Dance!" splashed across the back was NOT the worst of it. Her hubby did not appreciate any of this, I've just learned.

This year, given the weirdness of our relationship of late, I kept the gag gift simple. It was a book called, "Watch Your F*cking Language." It's about swearing effectively. Of course, in my family we all know how to swear quite effectively, but I thought this would bring some humor to the day.

Yesterday my sister emailed me and told me she's finally found the book and was enjoying learning some subtlties of usage that she hadn't previously considered. "Found it?" I emailed back?

Then she told me how her husband had taken the book out of her hands the moment she opened it because he didn't think it was appropriate for her.

I'll let you think about that for a moment.

My sister is 54 years old and her 57 year old husband is taking things from her hands because of "appropriateness." Their kids are 15 to 22 and, believe me, they know their curse words.

I responded to my sister with more incredulity. Seems he confiscated the copies of the Bunny Suicides books, too.

I checked with my 22 year old nephew, and he confirms the story.

I told you - totally absurd.