Social Filter Short Circuits

This one is an old one that I wrote and posted on facebook.  I want to have everything in one place:
Everyone has a social filter.  It is that subconscious regulatory body that prevents you from relaying your favourite Family Guy jokes to your boss, telling your parents about that truly embarrassing yet hysterical thing that happened to your best friend when she was having sex with that guy last week, or discussing hemorrhoids when your landlady asks if your baby is everything you thought she was going to be.

Near the end of my maternity leave, I started to notice that my social filter was malfunctioning.  Off-colour jokes were coming out in mixed company.  Snide things that I'd sometimes think, but would never say were being said.  Perhaps it's because I wasn't spending enough time outside the house.  Perhaps I was too high strung (many of you who know me might say 'entirely likely').  Perhaps if you comment on your baby's bowel movements too many times with other adults, your social filter actually short circuits (social filters do not condone poo talk.  No matter how many times your baby exploded out of her diaper at inappropriate times).  Perhaps I just needed a hobby to bring me into more contact with other adults.

Case in point:
My first incident occured when we were buying a new car.  I had the baby on my knee and she was squirming and whining and generally being annoying.  We were going through the paperwork and because I was a foolish female and my auto-savvy man wasn't there, he was trying to convince me that even though I had a 5-yr factory warranty, I should still get the super-double-extended-warranty for my gas cap, rearview mirror and the decal on my keychain (which- to be fair- I bought.  And then later my auto-savvier man called in and opted out of).  My patience was really thin and I was snappier than I might have been (many of you are shocked, I know).  He said: "She's a rascal isn't she? (sign here) I bet sometimes you want to send her back where she came from! (initital here)."  To which I responded "Well, I sometimes think about it, but I don't think she'd fit."  And then, I palmed her head.  To show how big it was.
Awkward silence...  Honestly.  Was I thinking that this would make the process go more smoothly and painlessly?  Without your filter, it's just verbal diarrhea (my filter just spiked at the mention of diarrhea- clearly it's working now...).

Incident number two:
I was in a medical waiting room with a bunch of other new mothers-all of us with a sheet containing 'Baby's First Milestones'.  As often does, it became a competition of whose baby was more developmentally advanced.  The first woman- reading the milestone for 9mths that says 'can take socks off' (like really people- are we going to get competitive about that?  We're setting the bar pretty low aren't we?  It's not like they've knit those socks themselves)- said "My baby can take her socks off AND her pants".  To which another replied: "MY baby can take her socks and pants off, and her shirt too".  Normally I'd think something nasty and snicker quietly to myself, praying for the situation to end.  I'd also probably be smugly praising myself for not engaging in the parading of my baby's worth based on whether or not she can make a 'pincer grasp' , but my filter was one step behind me.  It didn't stop the 'make fun of these women' impulse in time.  I said "MY baby can get her socks and pants and shirt off, and THEN she makes out with boys.  She's VERY advanced."
Instant social pariah.  This time not just with the one car salesman, but with a roomful of cranky and underslept women.  Who clearly did not get my joke.

Anyways, my point is- when on maternity leave, get a hobby.