Exhibit B: The Know-It-All Factor

I debated long and hard about this post.  I know it will cause some tension, but it is too funny not to share.  Now, I want to be clear, my family members are some of the smartest people I know.  But intelligence and reasoning are two very separate gifts.  One of their flaws is that most of them believe they know more than you about any given subject.  I'm not excluding myself from this, I have certainly been guilty of it more times than I care to admit.  I was lectured to on a variety of subjects from how to properly load a dishwasher to the correct pronunciation of Celeborn from a very young age.  This led to outrageous competitiveness and not very good sportsmanship.  I like to think I have been humbled as an adult and no longer do this, but I'm sure I sink back into old habits sometimes.  Here are some examples of my family being know-it-alls when, in fact, they should have just let it go. 
I like to cook dinner for my family when I go to visit.  Because for the most part they are not accomplished in the kitchen and my dad doesn't believe in salt.  Last year I made some pasta.  It was readily devoured because I'm a decent cook.  After, my dad asks me what kind of cheese I put on it.  I said, "goat cheese."  He and my brother look at me baffled and my dad says, "yes, but what kind of goat cheese?  There are lots of them."  The two of them proceed to list all the exotic cheeses they can think of.  Here are the ones I remember: Camembert, Brie, Romano, Feta and Roquefort.  Okay, I'm no cheese expert, so I say, "I don't think those are made from goat milk.  All I know is I go to the deli and buy a little container that says "Goat Cheese" on it."  Like so:

An argument over the ridiculousness of this statement ensues. 
By the way, Camembert and Brie are traditionally made with cow's milk.  Romano too, although it can be made with goat's milk, but that still wouldn't make it goat cheese.  Feta and Roquefort are sheep's milk.  To be fair I had to Wiki all of those except Roquefort.  But that is all beside the point because goat cheese (also called chevre) is it's own separate kind of cheese, not all cheeses that use goat's milk are goat cheese.  But somehow, despite my culinary prowess and grocery store knowledge, I couldn't not be correct in this case.  Luckily, however, I got the last word, because I wrote a blog about it. Clearly I'm super mature and have outgrown all the competitiveness.

I went to visit my ailing grandpa a few summers ago.  Posted on the front door was piece of paper printed up by my dad warning of the presence of MRSA Medication Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus in the home and a list of precautionary measures to avoid infection by said fell bacterium.  I may not be a cheese expert, but I majored in microbiology, so I know a little about bacteria.  So, when I went inside I said, to my mother, "Slugweirta, don't you mean methicillin resistant staph aureus?  That's what MRSA stands for."
Wanting the situation to sound as dire as possible she says, "no, this is new strain it's resistant to all medication."  I bite my tongue.  Because I'm a grown up and stuff.
To my dying day I will not be able to explain the following story.  At Beadle's bridal shower we played a game, you had to list words that start with each letter of the alphabet that have something to do with the topic "Wedding Day" if someone else has the same answer as you, you don't get a point. Like Scattergories.  The following is what I can remember of my mother's list
Anxiety (ok, fair enough 1 pt)
Barf (What? that's a lot of anxiety)
Diarrhea
Escherichia coli (I'm not sure how bacteria got involved here, at least they're susceptible to medication)
Fainting (I can see that)
GERD (reflux? really?)
Jaundice (unless you drank yourself to liver failure, I don't see this)
Kuru  (if you don't know, this is a degenerative brain disease that you get from eating human brains)
Nausea
Panic
Queasiness
Tired
Unhappy
Venereal disease (nice, mom)
Xenophobia
There was one for every letter, she got 26 points, because no one wanted to argue with her.
The last story is about Beadle, losing her mind about losing to my husband at a game of mini golf.  I know she is super embarrassed about this story, but it makes me laugh every time I think of it.  Apparently she prides herself on her putt-putt skills.