Ennui is defined as a feeling of listlessness and dissatisfaction arising from a lack of occupation or excitement. And in my case, it means that I haven’t been ‘into some sort of mischief’ for the past 24-48 hours. I had a free day today so I heeded a summons from my second oldest daughter and spent the morning working on her sprinkler system. Such was the grist of the day. Around noon, after making a Costco run with her and eating lunch at that epicurean center of modern cheap cuisine, I had to log into an internet site on my i-phone and deal with stuff. The security questions ticked me off:
What was the name of your first School. The correct answer was Thomas Alva Edison Elementary, Mesa, AZ. I started with Thomas Edison Elementary – WRONG; Edison Elementary; WRONG – Thomas Alva Edison Elementary; WRONG!

Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot, over?
It got me thinking about more interesting security password questions like these:
What was the name of your first pet to be run over by a car?
In which city did you first make love? (make and model of the car optional for heightened security.)
What is your ex-wife’s current last name?
What was the name of your father’s favorite mistress?
In what year did you abandon your dreams and decide to ‘settle’?
I called the company and they told me that they’d been having problems with the website and we managed the mischief over the phone, but as I type, I’m still not sure what answer the website will accept once it is fixed.
Do any of you have thoughts on better security password questions?

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31 COMMENTS

  1. Ha – I can answer every one of those questions (including make and model) except about my ex wife since I don't have one.

  2. That's the point, isn't it?

    They aren't stupid questions such as, "name your favorite book" – I have many and 'favorite' changes from time to time.

  3. All good good questions,
    LOL,and like Adrienne, I can answer all of them, (including make & model). Chance the ex wife to ex husband's girlfriend and I can answer that one as well.

  6. I guess that you could lie about that one if it was embarrassing. The same if it asked the name of a fat girl that you picked up at 2:00 am at a bar in Poughkeepsie… you could claim ignorance and brain damage from alcohol poisoning the same way that Hillary did with the FBI.

  7. Of course you can answer my questions. It's the dumb ones that the companies have you pick from that you can't necessarily recall. Such as "Name your favorite pet". What if you had more than one favorite and were being pushed to recall how you answered four years previously?

  13. I love this. Your questions are so much better. My bank keeps asking me the name of my first boyfriend. I mean, I remember, but do I REALLY WANT to have to recall his face every time I check my accounts? Seems like a bizarre form of memory brainwashing.

  14. Those are all excellent, but pretty dangerous, it seems to me. Won't those be troublesome when your current squeeze tries to hack in and sees the questions?

    One-word body location of worst scar given to you by a woman while you were arguing, fully clothed.

    First name of buddy you argued with about whether a "Dear Penthouse" letter was real or fake.

    First word you shouted at your 4-year-old daughter, before catching yourself, when she pushed an oil passage plug too deep to retrieve into the main bearing passage on an engine you were restoring, for no good reason at all.

    Last name of the Norwegian guy who caused you to get your first work suspension due to fighting over the aftermath of a practical joke gone bad. (e.g., "Blankson")

    Name of the small town on whose outskirts you were parked when you first had sex standing in the bed of a pickup truck (hoods, sunroofs count) without being spotted or shot at. Don't count coitus interuptus or bleedus profusus from impailus on farm implementus in back of truck. (e.g., West Fork xxxx River)

  18. Lawn sprinklers.

    In reclaimed desert land where the sun shines and moisture from the sky is never frozen, they're needed to keep the lush turf green all year long.

    But that's a long damned answer to a security question.

  21. 1: Chaos the cat
    2: Majorca – Mercedes Benz
    3: N/A
    4: Lou-Lou
    5: N/A – still living the dream.

    Foxtrot-Oscar- Juliette

  22. Now I have those passwords, I can hack into the MI-6 mainframe! (cackles like an evil scientist – or Hillary, which is so creepy that I shouldn't have written it)

  23. Maybe karma is telling you that he was the one for you?

    Or maybe not.

    In any event, financial institutions need to get onboard with the new philosophy behind security questions:

    What disease killed your maternal grandfather (if deceased – if living, what disease do you think will kill him)?

    What is your favorite sexual position?

    What is your Chinese Zodiac (different from Greek) sign – Year of the Rat, Year of the Monkey, etc?

  24. >One-word body location of worst scar given to you by a woman while you were arguing, fully clothed.
    Heart. [though technically not scarred over yet — still bleeding]
    (There's "Dear Abby" pathos for you then!)

  25. That could be a good party game at the White Wolf Mine. Short-straw drawer has to crouch in a juniper bush and cackle like Hillary, and then try to survive the ensuing fusillade of gunfire unleashed in his/her direction.

    Jules – "Lou-Lou?" Seriously?

  26. I think that Lou-Lou is a perfectly good name for a mistress. Granted, it's more appropriate if she's a pole dancer or something like that.

  27. Grunt – we turn the hounds loose first and then shoot whatever is tree'd. Or the savage feral hounds tear the object that is looking for a tree, to pieces. The hounds get an early snack and it's good practice for them.

    Such is the fate of anyone in the bushes that sounds remotely like Hillary Clinton.

  28. "Worst" scar could be a matter of judgment and the "worst" could change from the point in time when you elected "heart" and it became castration with explosives. Or "sodomy with explosives if you are gay".

    It's a kin to asking your favorite pizza. It might be Luigi's on the first of the month and they you go to Vitos and the world changes for you.

    It's like asking whether you sing tenor or bass… after castration with explosives, the answer changes.

  29. Ok. "Body location of that scar that Lou-Lou gave you *THE SECOND TIME* she spun around, inverted on the pole, and got you with the heel of her left stiletto."

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