Oh Lairdie, Lairdie

My daughter understands -- and shares -- my somewhat odd sense of humor.  Gillian knows, among other things, that I find pretentiousness absolutely hilarious. She also was the prime target for years of the outlandish yarns of my own inflated importance that I have been known to tell with the straightest of faces.

So Gillian found the perfect birthday gift for me this year.  She gave me the deed to a tiny plot in Scotland, the real value of which is that it bestows me with a semi-royal title.

The birthday mail brought me a very official-looking envelope that held a large parchment certificate granting me the right to be called "The Much Honoured Clyde Howard Bentley, Laird of Glencoe."

And I don't even have to wear a kilt.  Until my next birthday present, that is.

I was happily dreaming of proclaiming my lairdship to my students, who would be so impressed they would avert their eyes from Facebook for a few seconds.

Then I noticed the address on that envelope.  I may be laird of the manner in Glencoe, but in the postal world I am "Laid Clyde Bentley."

I thought of a half-dozen comments of questionable taste that I could make about that typo.  But then I realized how how much harder it would have been to live with the title had those editor-less Scots moved their keyboard fumble just one character to the left.

"Lard Clyde Bentley."