English As a First Language

There are certain days when it seems that I am unable to understand what people are trying to say. Yesterday was one of those days.

During Sunday School, the teacher was teaching about the wonderful world of forgiveness.

Teacher: The act of forgiving doubles, triples, quadruples . . .

Me: (whispering to the girl next to me) What is a double? How can you forgive a double? Is he talking about baseball? Quadruple? It's called a home run!

And while I was whispering, I missed the end of his comment, which the girl next to me kindly repeated.

Teacher: . . . our ability to love others.

Turns out that doubles can be a verb.

In the opening announcements in Elders' Quorum, the president introduced some of the new callings in the quorum.

EQP: And, though we didn't need this calling last year, we are certainly going to need one this year. Joe Schmo has been called as the Set-up director.

Me: (in my head) Are you kidding me? They called someone to set us up on dates? That's really weird. I don't think I like the idea of a stranger receiving revelation on who I need to go out with. I don't even receive that revelation! And why do we need it more this year than last? Are we obviously uglier than the people who lived here before?

Me: (out loud) Set-up director?

Someone else: For setting up the chairs before sacrament meeting.

That makes more sense.

Whether it is caused by my inattention, my ignorance, or my imagination, my inability to
understand basic English needs to be taken care of. I am going to buy a learn English in five cassette tapes later today. That should take care of it.