Now for a normal person, this wouldn’t be worth blogging about BUT since it was hubby and it goes against virtually everything he believes in, I had to put it out there into the blogosphere to try to solicit some sympathy.  Because, for my life, I cannot figure this man out.

If you don’t understand why this would matter, you should read this post:  You’re Gonna Ruin It.

It’s in that post where I first shared hubby’s aversion to “contaminating” his cheese pizza with anything but cheese.   This has been an on-going battle since the day I met hubby.  I like toppings on my pizza and he doesn’t.   As I mentioned in that last post, we haven’t been able to find a happy medium without ordering separate pizzas, because the minute I add any toppings to half the pizza, I have “ruined his plain cheese half with flavor & smells from my toppings”.  And, my dear blog readers, apparently this is just plain unacceptable!

BUT… just when you think you have him figured out, he likes to change things up on you.

So, we’re out to dinner with friends and he decides he wants a pizza.  The waiter comes over and he orders just that… a cheese pizza.  Then the waiter starts prodding him.  “Just cheese??” he says.   To which I reply, “He won’t eat anything but plain cheese….. everything else ruins his pizza!”  But the waiter isn’t letting this one pass, he says “wouldn’t you want some peppers, or maybe some onions, or how about some sausage?”.   And hubby looks at him, as if he’s contemplating these offerings.  I, on the other hand, am steadfast in my opinion of his pizza order.  I KNOW that hubby won’t contaminate his pizza.  I’ve had to have this debate for the last 10 years.  It always ends the same way…. nothing but cheese.

But hubby seems to waver.

The waiter presses on….. “We make a fantastic sausage & pepper pizza”.   Our friends join in… “They do make a great sausage & pepper pizza”.   I chime in… “What’s going on with you?  Are you about to be pressured into pizza with toppings????  You and I have argued this very topic for years and if you change you mind, right here, right now….. I may just have to kill you.”   

“OK” he says…. “sausage & peppers it is!”.   And then, I fainted, fell out of my chair, and they had to rush me to the hospital.     Did MY husband just order toppings on his pizza?  It couldn’t be?  We’ve discussed this ad nauseum,  I’ve begged, I’ve pleaded.  I’ve rationalized with him about the fact that separately, he likes sausage and he likes peppers.  All to no avail.  I must always eat just plain cheese unless I want to get my own personal pizza.  And now, here we are, and he’s succumbing to peer pressure at the restaurant.  WHERE WAS THIS WAITER 10 YEARS AGO???????????????

After he orders, again, I have to say to him… “Are you sure?  What’s going on with you?  Did you just cave in and order something you don’t really want?  Cause, we can still change this and put the universe back on it’s axis!”.   And, he looks at me and smugly replies…. “Nope, I’m totally happy.  I want sausage & peppers”.    And that moment folks, was when I realized that I wanted smack him right upside the head.    But instead, I gave him the reply that always seems to follow any ridiculous or impossible to understand behavior…….  “You know, you really are EXHAUSTING…………”

Now, I have no idea if this was an isolated incident (likely).  And, I’m having trouble celebrating that he’s finally opened his eyes to a new form of pizza since it was only once (probably).   And beyond all of that, sometimes I wonder if he chooses to be difficult just to test me……. and now, after 10 years of toying with me, he’s deemed it time to shake things up a bit.    And everyone wonders why I started a blog…………………………………

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I hate the entire process from the moment you walk through the door, to the fake conversation, to the irritating salesman yapping in the back of the car during the test drive, to the “why don’t you sit down for a bit”, to the pass off to the manager, to the annoying follow-up calls after I have long decided I do not want to buy your over-priced, under-performing, gas guzzling vehicle.

I guess you could say that I’m a bit over-the-top on my hatred of car shopping.

It’s actually ironic given that it’s 100% due to car shopping that I ever even met hubby.  You’d think that the benefit, misfortune…. no, I’ll stick with benefit, I received in meeting my wonderful husband, would have somehow dissipated my hatred for this experience – but it totally hasn’t.

If you read my follow-up story to “How It All Began” then you know that hubby, while he may not love the process, is so smitten with the fact the he’s about to own a new vehicle, he can tolerate the horrible dance that is car buying.

Sooooo…. when I start getting notices in the mail that our car is coming to the end of it’s lease, I start to get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and I dread every day where hubby might suggest we check out new cars.  All the while hubby is humming and smiling and Googling up a storm, researching new vehicles.  (btw – the reason we usually lease is so that hubby  can subject me to this torture can experience this excitement every 3 years)

“Oooohhh look at this one”  he might say…..

“This one gets great ratings” he tries to lure me in…..

“So-and-so has one of these and he really likes it” he tries to engage me in conversation…..

“This one has a V6, 320 horsepower, 269 torque….” I honestly have no idea where he’s going with this one…. unless maybe he’s buying me a pony, horses?  I don’t know…….

Needless to say, our lease is almost due.  And, this particular new car brings with it special excitement.  You see, hubby has been forced to drive my car for the last year and a half.  This is just dreadful since he didn’t get to pick out the car, doesn’t necessarily like the car and has been “suffering” through it for sooooo long.    (Now, without boring you with far too many details, here’s why hubby is driving “my” car:   I received a new company car smack in the middle of my personal lease and hubby’s lease was up shortly afterwards so, since no one was driving my car,  we decided he would drive “my” car until the lease was up.)

So there we are, still 5 months out from the end of the lease and hubby is already focused on new cars.

We drive down the road and he says… “what do you think of that car?”

We’re watching tv and he says…..”what do you think of that car?”

We’re making out, naked, in bed and he says ….. “what do you think of that car?”  

Ok… maybe I took it too far with the last one… but needless to say, with 5 months to spare, it seems to consume his every thought.   I’m ready to put him into “my” car and send it over a cliff.  This way I wouldn’t have to listen to him for the next 4 months (this has already been happening for a month!) AND I wouldn’t have to subject myself to the process of buying a new car -this is the best part EVER!   It’s sort of like a win-win all around….. no??!!

Ok yes, I’d be sad without hubby…. but more importantly, WHAT ON EARTH WOULD I BLOG ABOUT?  

Ok, you’re right,  I guess I’ll have to reconsider that plan…………………………  just say a little prayer for me that I make it through the next few months!

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This is a stink bug.

If you don’t live in certain areas of the US, you should consider yourself lucky that you don’t need to deal with this pest.

Sting bugs are truly one of the dumbest bugs I’ve ever encountered.  They are incredibly slow moving and they are downright stupid and fly themselves into windows, furniture & walls.  They also put up virtually no fight when you attempt to squash them – none whatsoever.  Their main weapon to prevent you from smushing them, is certainly not their ability to run away, it’s the impending stench that they emit once they’ve been squashed – thus the name “Stink Bug”.   Now, trust me when I tell you that this, in no way, deters me from grabbing these litter stinkers in a tissue and crumbling them up to either toss in the trash or flush down the toilet.  So, might I say, their ingenious method of preventing their own demise is generally pretty unsuccessful.

UNLESS………  you are my hubby.

Now let me clarify… hubby is not, in fact, scared off by their smell.  They apparently appeal to another of hubby’s weaknesses:  An Exploration of Stupidity.

Hubby is fascinated at how dumb these ugly-ass bugs are soooooooooooo… he apparently decided to conduct his own “experiment” (unbeknownst to me)

I have no friggin idea how these dang bugs get into our house.  But never fail, each week we find one either slowly crawling on the fireplace, or sitting on the curtains or perhaps (when they get an unexplained burst of energy) flying into the wall.  So one day, I’m in our family room and I notice that one’s sitting on a plant leaf.  I yell to hubby (who’s in the kitchen).  “Hey babe…. can you grab a paper towel?  There’s a stink bug in here”.  And he surprisingly replies “I know”.  So in my head I’m like…… What do you mean….. you know?   If you are aware that there’s a stink bug in here, why haven’t YOU killed it already?   But, as you probably know with hubby, sometimes you just have to let the conversation unfold to figure out how his insane little mind works.   I respond  “You know?”.  And I hear him yell from the other room…. “Well, are you talking about the one on the plant?  Cause if so, I know.”  So now I’m thinking… Ok, so you do in fact know about the SAME stink bug I’m referring to.  Why on earth didn’t you just kill it,  if you’re aware of it.  I mean come on, I know you can be lazy, and I know you sometimes have selective vision but it’s a FREAKIN bug, in our HOUSE – apparently in plain sight – and you opted to leave it be???  I could perhaps rationalize the laziness factor if it was on the ceiling and would have required a ladder to kill or perhaps, if it was a bug that could furiously flitter around the house and you gave up on chasing it BUT, it’s a barely mobile stink bug that would have sat there and calmly awaited it’s fate.   So, in my more exasperated wife tone I say. “I don’t get it.  If you know it’s there, why didn’t you just kill it?”.  And his response folks……. wait for it………….  “Because I wanted to test to see how long it would sit in the same spot – you know how dumb these bugs are.”

Yes my dear blog readers……. he wanted to “see how long it would stay in the same spot”.  I swear, I can’t make this shit up……………….

So, as I now get up to grab a paper towel because I can see I’m not about to get any help, I say to him.  “You do realize that once it moved out of that spot, you would no longer know where it is…. right?”  And he smartly replies, “Yes, I know that but that’s really not a big deal since it’s been there for over 2 days already.”

And once again, I feel the need to repeat what hubby said… just in case you missed it….. that friggin bug had ALREADY BEEN THERE FOR OVER 2 DAYS!!!!!!!!!!   

I’m not sure in what place or world, it’s ok to happily live alongside a bug for the sake of an experiment but I can tell you, that  it’s MOST DEFINITELY not my family room……………. UGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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As you know, Hubby loves his Christmas tree.  He can shop a full day to find the perfect tree, he can pout for days about the perfect lights AND… he can spend hours getting the ornaments just right in the proper place on the decorated tree (even if he did get fired from decorating this year).

It’s this last part that I wanted to discuss today… the decorating of the tree.  (I meant to get this posted before the holiday so it was more timely but I just couldn’t fit it in…..)

Here’s a little known fact – hubby is a bit quirky, or maybe a little OCD, or perhaps just a bit anal….. ok, this isn’t a little known fact at all.  I have blogged about it more times that I can count but let’s just pretend, in the honor of New Year’s Resolutions, that this is the first time I’m telling you about this.

Hubby likes many things to be just a certain way  and if you use the wrong bowl, gouge the cheese or add unnecessary toppings, you could potentially throw the entire universe out of whack.  Knowing this, there are many elements of holiday decorating that I just don’t touch.  One element, as I mentioned before the holiday, is his Army of Nutcrackers.  The other is a select assortment of Christmas ornaments.  “Hubby’s ornaments”. Ornaments that require:   Special Attention.  Special Placement.  Special Stories.

Yes… I said stories.

The most important ornament is hubby’s “explorer” elf.  This elf is so important that he was actually kidnapped and held for ransom many years ago.  I kid you not.  Ok, bear with me, I’m about to go off on a tangent.

 
This particular ornament is an ornament from hubby’s childhood.  Like many great parents sending their young’ uns into the world, hubby’s mom packed up a few special ornaments for her son when he ventured off into the world of marriage… this ornament was one of the lucky few to come with us to our new home.   When hubby’s brother realized the horrific act their mother had perpetrated, of gifting this precious ornament to us, he decided to take action.  So, he broke into our house, stole the elf off our first Christmas tree, wrote a ransom note and texted us images of the elf, bound & gagged…. with ridiculous demands for his return.  I only wish I had known I’d be blogging some 8 years later and I would have saved these images… because they are truly priceless.  But alas, I do not have the power to see the future and these pictures & ransom note are long gone.    I have mentioned in the past that my life is filled with laughter and ridiculous behavior when hubby & his brother get together and this is but just a glimpse of why…………

Anywho… we did eventually recover the elf and Christmas magic was returned to our home.

So, back to the my present day elf story.

Each year Hubby likes to create a “scene” within our Christmas tree that reflects a story he’s created for this pioneering elf.  I will do my best to convey this “story” to you.

You see, this elf likes to live in a “Christmas cave” within our tree.  He is gingerly situated inside the branches and is surrounded by the itty-bittiest ornaments whose placement is agonized over by hubby to create the perfect scene each year.  The elf holds a single light to illuminate his cave and he sports a nifty backpack for exploration of his surroundings as he discovers the magic of  miniature holiday items throughout his “cave”.

I’m sure I’ve done a disservice to this story… as hubby does it much better and has a certain twinkle in his eye and he describes his elf and the magical nook in our tree.

After his little cave is created, hubby likes to step back and admire his work and he likes to talk about the miniature little scene.  On more occasions than I can count, I’ve found hubby all by himself, standing in front of the tree with a tiny smile looking through a “window” in the branches to check on his magical elf.  I can only imagine what’s going through his mind as he thinks about this mini elf cave.   I wonder if he’s thinking about how much better the cave would be with surround sound, or perhaps a mini flat screen tv…. or maybe, just maybe,  he’s wondering how we can find mini soda cans to try to bring the “magic” of his own Man Cave into our Christmas tree.  

I suppose the one good thing here is that, while hubby can enjoy this mini elf “cave” just as much as his actual Man Cave…… this one doesn’t require any cleaning.  And that my dear friends is what makes this cave magical for me too.  Well that, and the fact that it’s the ONE TIME a year that hubby actually participates in any sort of home decorating!  Now, if I could only figure out a way to make choosing curtains more “magical”??!!

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This year (well really it started a while ago) it happened in the most cute, endearing, irritating way possible.

Please allow me to set the scene.

Flash back to over 2 years ago.

We are driving down the street and a tiny little local restaurant has a “santa pig” on his roof.   Hubby gets all excited… “ooooh…..ooooh…. Look!  They have a Santa Pig!”.  Like any good wife, I reply… “Uh, huh….” and then continue whatever I was doing.

Then for the next month, Every. Single. Time. we drive down this street hubby talks about the Santa Pig.

– “Here comes the Santa Pig………….”

– “Oooooh….. guess what’s on the next block??    The SANTA PIG!”

– “I would like a Santa Pig”

– “Gee… wouldn’t it be cool to have a Santa Pig”

And on.. and on…. and on……

And each time we pass this stupid santa pig…. I try very nicely to explain to dear hubby that the reason this restaurant has a Santa Pig on their roof is likely because they advertise pulled pork sandwiches on their building.  I say to him…. “you do understand the relevance ….. right?”  And of course he replies   “yes, I understand…… BUT, wouldn’t it be COOL to own a Santa Pig????”  And then, I sit there in silence because there’s no reason to attempt to debate this……

Fast forward to last holiday season.

It’s the first week of December… we are driving down the road.  Hubby merrily declares…”ooooohhh….. ooohhhhh…. I bet the Santa Pig is back!”.  To which I reply.  “Good lord, you nut job, why are you so fascinated by a silly light-up pig!”.  And he, so matter-of-factly states…. “Cause it’s  A-W-E-S-O-M-E …  why else?!”   And then, I sit there in silence for    j u s t  -  a   -  m o m e n t.  And then, I can’t help myself…..   “It’s a PIG.  I don’t get what’s awesome about it?”   And he says to me.  “How could you not think it’s awesome.  How often have you ever seen a pig in a santa suit?   Know what would make it even MORE awesome?”   I can’t imagine the correct response here……  “If it were MINE!!!!”

And then I jumped out of the car and ran screaming into traffic……. ok, no wait, that was only in my mind………………………..

Then, the coup de grâce:   One day, last year, we come across a holiday decoration display at a local store and lo-and-behold what do we stumble upon?   Ok, let me paint a better picture.  We don’t quite “stumble” upon it.  It went more something like this…. Hubby spotted it from afar.  He became excited & giddy and sprinted across the room, knocking down old ladies and screaming…. “SANTA PIG,  SANTA PIG!!!!!!!”.  And, like any good parent to a toddler who is acting up in a store, I pretended I didn’t know him and walked in the other direction…………

So here we are…. Christmas 2011. 

Hubby has been wearing me down for years.  And, as I begin to start my holiday shopping I remember how happy this dang santa pig makes him.  And, against ALL of my better judgment.  I scour the internet to search out a Santa Pig to put under the tree for my dear hubby.  

Yes folks, I am either the best wife on the planet, or the dumbest person around.   And, I can only imagine what the neighbors will say next year…….

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From our family to yours….. please have a very safe & happy holiday!

And… I hope you get everything you’ve wished for.   I, on the other hand, am probably not getting a live in maid and a bag of puppies but I’m holding onto hope until tomorrow!

For the next few days I navigate my way around our house like a mine field.  I squeeze through the hallway upstairs, I step over crap at the bottom of the stairs and I slide heavy items out of the way so I can pass.  And then… almost like clockwork, hubby disappears to go to a Giants game.  And miraculously, when he returns, our home looks like Christmas.   Now, don’t get me wrong, I like to decorate for the holiday and I don’t necessarily *need* hubby’s participation in choosing which shelf gets Sniffles the snowman, or where to put the tree in the North Pole Village BUT, hubby does *need* to be involved in some things.

I do not touch hubby’s army of nutcrackers.  If you recall from last year, these soldiers are meticulously assembled on their battle line each holiday season.  And I never, ever, take on this decorating task.  The nutcracker bin may well sit in the dining room for another week after the rest of the house is completely decorated anxiously awaiting hubby’s assembling of the army (which apparently must be done “on it’s own time” and “cannot be rushed”).

The other key element that I never do alone is our tree. 

I’ve spoken about the importance of selecting the right tree in the past.  And, I’ve outlined how fun, merry, exciting, magical,  errr… uhmmm.. thorough our shopping excursions can be to find the perfect tree.  But what I haven’t written about is the details of our tree.

Let’s start with the lights…. which are a never-ending battle at my house (hmmmm… perhaps I should have enlisted my own army!)  I have a preference for white lights on our Christmas tree and hubby has a preference for colored lights.  I always win  (just as any wife should!).  And we have white lights on the tree.   Now, in all actuality, I owned a home before I met hubby and I already had a TON of Christmas stuff, including many boxes of white lights… so, it’s almost as if the choice was already made and we just continued down this path. BUT, it doesn’t stop hubby from wishing, whining, pouting each year as he strings on the white lights.  He says things like:

“Know what would make this tree look even better?”……………..”colored lights”

“Know what would make my Christmas truly magical?” …………….”colored lights”

“Know what makes fantastic Christmas trees look less fantastic?” ……………”white lights”

I’m sure you can see where I’m going with this.

Anyhow, a very long, and somewhat unrelated story but….. we hit the lottery this year and decided to buy new LED lights to decorate the outside of our house. — OK – before you get all excited for us — we didn’t actually win the lottery, but you really need to, in order to afford LED lights…. Holy Crap… what are they made of GOLD??!!  ($30 friggin dollars for a dang string of lights – WTH?!)  Ok, I’m getting way off topic here.  Back to my tree.

The long story resulted in us “stealing” some of our “inside” lights for outside and left us with white LED lights to put on our Christmas tree.  (And now you can see the tree from outerspace and you need to wear sunglasses in our house…. but hey, we’re saving energy!!).  And hubby, like every year (while he was fascinated by the bright lights - as every man would be…..) still pouted about not having colored lights on his tree.    

And then, to make matters worse…… come the bows.

I always finish our tree with small burgundy bows.   Hubby hates bows on trees.   I have no idea if perhaps he was attacked by a roll of fabric when he was younger, or maybe his mom gave everyone in the family gifts with bows while hubby got  coal for Christmas, but he is horribly prejudiced against pretty bows.  This is another tree decorating battle that I generally win (just as any wife should).  And hubby, once again, always pouts.

“Know what would make this tree look even better?” ………”colored lights and NO bows”

“Know what would make my Christmas truly magical?” ……….”colored lights and NO bows”

“Know what makes fantastic Christmas trees look less fantastic…… “white lights and ugly bows”

I have no idea why hubby could give a crap about every-single other decorating conversation I force him to have the other 364 days of the year.  And then all of a sudden he’s an authority on the “perfectly” decorated Christmas tree.

And that my dear friends….. is how I ruin Christmas, each and every year, for my dear hubby.

(now, if you can keep it a secret……  next year, I may just let hubby have free reign over the tree but it’s taken me years to mentally prepare myself for what sort of tree we might wind up with!)

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– No, not the season for big-bellied men dressed in red.

– Not the season for decorations and yuletide (what the hell is yuletide anyway??)

– Not even the season of merriment & gift giving.

It’s the season of the cold.  Or the flu.  Or sniffling, sneezing coughing, aching, stuff head, fever….. oh, wait… I just started to sound like a commercial……

Anyhow, if you’re unlucky (like many women) and happen to have a man in your life.  You might just be entering into the season of the Man Flu or Man Cold.  Both of which are far worse, more crippling, and just plain downright more awful than any “normal” cold or flu.

I’ve received calls from friends recently screaming “man down, man down”.   And, for a moment I’m confused and I start to duck for cover underneath my coffee table, and then I remember that nearly everyone I know is sick.  And, as this dreaded cold makes it’s rounds, I realize that their misfortune could easily be my misfortune.  As it’s only a matter of time before my own dear hubby succumbs to the death-bed-whining that could only indicate one thing:  He’s come down with a Man Cold.

It happens just about every year around this time.. I’ve posted before about not accepting the “in sickness” part of my marriage vows.  And, I feel for every women out there who must deal with their own version of this illness.  I would venture a guess though that there’s little variation all over the globe.  As it seems no man is immune.  That biologically speaking, bacteria somehow invades a man’s body worse than a woman’s.  That somehow a man’s immune system is weaker (yes men – I said you are weaker) than a woman’s.    It’s at this moment that they realize how much they need us.  Or at least how much they want to be coddled and waited on.  And, if we’re not performing these motherly, ahem.. wifely? duties up to par,   they revert back to whiny little boys.

Just this past week my brother-in-law posted this status update on Facebook:  “Home with the flu.. no visitors but will happily use what’s left of my strength to open the door for any girls that are available to pamper me and help me through this tough time”

(yes, he and my dear hubby are cut from the same cloth….. I’m a damn lucky girl that I have 2 of them in my life…… this is also the same brother that instigated the “floating buoys” in my pool….)

Anyhow, not only do they whine and act like sick children in the privacy of their own home, but it seems that are perfectly ok putting it out there in the universe that they are “dying” and need immediate care.  Have You No Shame??!!

To bring this point home, I recently stumbled on this video and I just had to share.

It’s a testimony to the male ‘pack mentality’.  If they all act like this when they are sick, then they will all support each other, and none of them will have any qualms about milking every last ounce of sympathy from anyone, anywhere, who will listen.

Ladies… take a stand.  Next time a Man Cold enters your home, cut to the chase and hand the man a phone just in case  he needs to dial an emergency #  (and then just hope that it’s a female EMT who answers his call!)

He was obviously slacking on the job.  He had received a warning, and failed to improve his performance.  So, in the low tolerance arena of Christmas Tree Decorating, he was summarily dismissed from his duties.

And, this was all driven by my 6 year old nephew.

Even my nephew quickly picked up on the fact that hubby likes to lean back in his chair and watch as people around him scramble to complete tasks.   Since he likes to do things on his own timeline, it seems that he was too slow to hang the ornaments and when he decided to sit down on the job, my nephew had enough and told him he was FIRED!

I suppose you could look at this one of two ways:

1)  My nephew is being taught at a very early age to not tolerate slackers and to not lower his expectations to meet people’s lack-luster performance

OR

2)  He’s being indoctrinated at a very young age into “traditional” male behavior.  Which dictates that you should slack off just enough so that people around you are compelled to finish your task.

It’s a sly way of training youngsters.  It’s not overt.   It’s certainly not detailed in any sort of literature (that would undoubtedly provide proof!)  It’s done in plain sight, in a way that doesn’t draw attention, but makes a little boy realize just how much their adult role model can get away with.  And then – the seed is planted.  All that needs to be done is to let it take root, and slowly grow as the boy gets older and dips his toe into the pool of “doing just enough to appear that you are trying - and then allowing someone else to finish the project”

It’s either BRILLIANT.   Or MADNESS!   I’m still not sure which.

But, I will say this…….There have been many days when I would like to fire hubby. 

Like the day when he sat next to me in front of the tv folding laundry.  I had folded 42 different items and hubby had folded 3.  Or the day when I asked him numerous times to move a heavy box into the basement and it sat there for weeks.  Or even the day when I asked him to clean his whiskers out of the sink, only to find that he must have made a swish of his hand with the sponge, and only captured an itty bitty fraction of what was actually in the sink and declared himself to be DONE!

"Slightly" adjusted to back up my case!

On all these days I would have liked to say “You’re Fired”.  But I’ve learned over the years that it’s far better (and much more rewarding) to look at him after he’s half-assed a task and happily declare… “You’re NOT fired”.  And, “I’m certain you will do better next time!”

Touché dear hubby touché!

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Anyhow, I thought I’d recycle an older post that shares the spirit of the holiday pretty well.. (and since there are quite a few new readers this year, I figured many of you may not have already read this..)

Hope you enjoy!

“A Hubby Diaries Christmas Poem”

‘Twas the week before Christmas, and all through the kitchen
There was crap everywhere and I couldn’t stop bitchin’
Dirty dishes were stacked on the counter with care,
As hubby ignored them, I gave him a glare

The laundry sat piled in mounds on the floor
I had just started sorting, but there still was much more
Hubby started to grumble, and I started to nag
We had just discussed cleaning, as I picked up a rag

When down in the basement, arose such a clatter,
I ran down the stairs, to see what was the matter.
Away to the Man Cave I flew like a bird
I worried and wondered about what I had heard

I braced myself as I made my mad dash
Perhaps something was broken, there had been loud crash
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a loud movie playing, and a cup filled with beer!

I stood for a moment, unable to think
Was he watching a movie and having a drink?
More rapid than eagles, mean thoughts came to mind
As he grinned and retreated and cowered in kind

“I’m sorry, I’m stupid, I’ll clean & I’ll scrub”
“I’ll vacuum, I’ll launder, I’ll scour the tub”
I promise I’ll help you, I’ll help clean the house
He muttered and stammered as meek as a mouse

He grabbed the remote and shut off the TV
He arrived in the kitchen and stood beside me
He sheepishly smiled and picked up a dish
The magic of Christmas.. I was getting my wish

And then, as I baked, and started to cook
I heard hubby humming, so I just had to look
The vacuum was running, the dusting was done
If I do say so myself, he was having some fun

The laundry was folded, the beds were all made
The cookies were baking, the bills were all paid
As a team we can do more, I had to decree
And, as much as he fought it, he had to agree

That evening we snuggled, the chores were all done
Our home was now ready for holiday fun
I told him I love him and he said, “love you too..”
“But, don’t expect cleaning, when there’s man stuff to do!”

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