must...not...laugh

Things are always funniest when you can't laugh. I can't read Dinosaur Comics (click here for my favorite) while holding a sleeping baby. This Notes from the Trenches post just made me wake up Hannah. It reminds me of when I was an undergrad in a lab researching herpes. My nose would start to itch like crazy right after I screwed the top off the vial of virus. I really wanted to itch my nose, but not with a herpes hand.

I think the worst bout of forbidden laughter I have ever had was in church. I was sitting with a friend's family, whose mother was exceedingly kind, but who was to be taken very seriously and was not to be crossed. It happened to be the end of a very odd several months, during which taking communion gave me butterfingers. The previous two times I had spilled it on myself; I don't know how, it just happened. Anyway, it happened a third time. On a new white sweater, which was just too much. And we lost it, laughing almost uncontrollably for several minutes during the most solemn part of the service, while Mrs. Coolbutstrict did all she could to keep her dignity and tell us to shutuprightnoworyouwillbesorry. It was the kind of hnnn.. hnnnn... hooo.. spespespespespespespe... hnn... hnnn laugh that almost sounds like you are alternately struggling to breath and blowing mini-raspberries. We couldn't stay quite for more than five minutes for the rest of the service.

I can't wait until Hannah is in junior high.