I know that a surprising number of you have clicked on the cowboy hat picture. You scamps. I feel like I should tell the whole story.

My mom started agitating sometime in 2006, saying that she didn’t have a good picture of me for the living room. My sister provides a regular supply of family photos with her kids (which is really cheating, because my nephews are beautiful and cherubic and have wonderful partially-toothy smiles). But if you don’t have kids, when do you go in and have actual pictures taken of yourself? Unless she wanted one of me hugging rando Amazing Race contestants, she was sort of out of luck. So when I asked what she wanted for her birthday, weeks ahead, she asked for a real picture. I assured her I would get one. “And I’m going to make this face in it,” I said. And then I made that face, from the cowboy hat picture. And because she kept laughing, I kept doing it: “Hey, Mom, don’t forget what I’m getting you for your birthday! [Face].” (Mom laughs; repeat until bored.)

When I actually went to get the pictures done, I was assisted by a really nice young woman who set me up with a variety of poses, including some that were wildly unflattering to me personally, but some of which were fine. I told her exactly what they were for, and at the end, I told her the story about tormenting my mother with the finger-guns threat. And she said, immediately, “OH MY GOD WE HAVE TO DO THAT.” She added the hat, she rolled down the backdrop, and I actually got myself to make that face in front of a stranger. I bought an 8×10 of that one as well as an 8×10 of the real one I was giving my mom, but the one I had them gift-wrap was the cowboy hat. Which I gave my mom at her birthday dinner. I think it took her about four seconds to realize this was undoubtedly not the real picture she was getting, but oh, they were such a good four seconds.