What now

I would love to get an email onto “Postcards from Yo Momma” – silly name, addictive site- to showcase my own mother’s particular brand of maternal madness. However, she doesn’t really send me substantial or funny emails. Occasionally text messages. We mostly do actual phone conversations.

~My mother and I are talking about school or something similarly mundane~
Me: Blah blah blah school is good, I’m stressed as usual, blah blah
Mom: Speaking of puppies, there is this pet photo contest online and I know someone who is trying to win, so this happened…
Me: Um. We weren’t talking about puppies
Mom: Huh? So the puppies are on this website blah blah, and this is why I like that picture, and you have to vote for my friend so she can win
Me: You can’t just say “speaking of blank” and then shift topic completely
~Mom laughs and keeps talking about puppies~

I suppose I can relate. Maybe sometimes we just need to be able to switch into a subject that is more important or real, even if it is very off-topic.

Basically Speaking of My Mother refers to any time you or someone else is talking about a particular topic and then abruptly switches gears, especially when they use the idiom “speaking of” to try to ease the awkward transition. It can also be used to actually make the transition, as in “Speaking of my mother, I want to talk about something that I actually care about so now I will”.