It’s funny the way things play out in life.
Some might say that it’s ironic that hubby can never find his keys when we have a spot where ALL the keys go.
Or perhaps irony is waiting weeks for hubby to call the landscaper and then the day I finally give up and call myself, hubby had already spoken to him earlier that morning.
Or maybe true irony is when I’ve just washed & folded 400 pieces of laundry but the one shirt hubby wants to wear tonight is still laying dirty in the laundry basket (ok, maybe not ironic, maybe intentional…but, ssssshhhhh… this will be our little secret)
But I’d have to say that I’ve hit the mother load of irony this week.
I’d like to share with you a picture I took TODAY.
Now you probably have your head cocked to the side and maybe you’re squinting a bit trying to figure out what you’re looking at.
Here, let me give you a different angle.
Any ideas yet?
I can’t actually help but chuckle to myself as I write this. It’s almost as if I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole and created my own wonderland. Or, my hubby is doing his absolute best to mess with my mind.
Whatever the case, let’s reflect on my 2 most recent posts in order to solve my picture question. One post was about hubby’s inability to put things where they belong, or more accurately, my musings about how many times something needed to be moved before it found a permanent home. The other was a glimpse into my on-going battle with hubby about leaving things on the stairs (are those pictures starting to make sense yet??)
Ok, so go with me here. When I write a post about hubby, I talk about things that really happen and things that are relevant to my immediate life. Most of the time my posts are a result of some “male” behavior hubby has exhibited that week that I simply don’t understand. I also try to tell you stories in a way that helps you get a feel for how things really happen. How we talk to each other, what I’m thinking etc. And, just so you know, my posts are always based on facts, I do not make up any of these stories.
So here’s a fact: Last week, when I mentioned some boxing hand wraps that had been relocated around my kitchen so many times I’d lost count, it was a result of my most recent attempt to reintroduce these to hubby.. I had removed them from the basket for the umpteenth time and placed them back on the kitchen table (hoping this ever-so subtle hint, coupled with an “outing” on an internet blog might actually solicit a response). Well, lo and behold…. SUCCESS!! Without even so much as a word – at least not a verbal word (I’m not counting the 1000 or so words on the internet!), hubby moved the hand wraps…. Right. To. The. Stairs.
Wait.. what?? Yep, he moved these friggin’ hand wraps right to the stairs (with what I’d have to assume is a final destination upstairs).
EXCEPT……………………
You know what happens when you assume……
(Are you starting to see the irony here????)
So, these dang wraps have been sitting on the stairs for over a week. And, I’ve really tried to just ignore them. But, I’ll admit it… I finally had a weak moment and I said…”Is there a plan for these hand wraps?”
And hubby says: “Ummm, yeah. I thought I was going to bring them upstairs but then I realized that I wasn’t really sure where I was going to put them when they got there”
So, I respond: “Ok, so please don’t tell me that their new home is the stairs???? I know you read the blog.. which is probably why you noticed them on the kitchen table in the first place. But I’m guessing you didn’t read the next post?” (or maybe he did and he’s trying to drive me into the looney bin so he can leave crap all over the house without ever being bothered or nagged again….???)
“No, I read it, and they were going to go upstairs” He said. “But I’ve changed my mind and now I think they should go to the basement” (wow, he’s actually using his noodle – and, I think “noodle” is probably the proper description of his cleaning logic skills since it’s a muscle he generally doesn’t exercise)
So, excitedly I respond: “Ok, that makes more sense than upstairs”. And, I’m smiling because I’m cautiously hopeful that we’ve come to a happy solution for both of us!
And that’s where the conversation ended.
And, that was 2 days ago.
And today, as you can see from my picture, they have not moved. Not. One. Inch.
I thought I had stumbled on a new way of communicating with hubby.. communication via the blog since I got exactly what I wanted, which was a relocation of the hand wraps from the kitchen. But, ironically enough, they wound up exactly where I didn’t want them.. on the frickin’ stairs……….
Thanks hubby….. for always keeping me on my toes (and by toes, I don’t mean tippy toes, necessary for navigating the cluttered stairs… but apparently you are full of surprises!)
Become a fan of The Hubby Diaries on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/thehubbydiaries
You could always do what I do: hide them, then after a month of not being asked where they are, throw them out.
I did that with an entire laundry basket that sat un-put-away for a week. He never noticed.
He’s a big boy. He’ll learn or he won’t. It’s not a fight worth having in my house! 🙂
LikeLike
Jessica ~ If I threw away everything that hubby either forgot about or wouldn’t put away, we might live in an empty house!!! And then, I’m actually pretty sure he’d be fine with buying “new” every time he went looking for something that wasn’t there. Then our arguments would be about wasting $$ . I’m beginning to see that this is a no-win situation for me. LOL! 😦
LikeLike
I think you overestimate his attachment and need for stuff. My husband almost never misses the stuff I get rid of, and few times he has, it’s in the first month when it’s hidden and I can retrieve it. 🙂
LikeLike
Jessica ~ sssshhhhhh…. don’t tell anyone but that’s how I rid us of scary, old t-shirts. They just never seem to make it back into the drawer! 🙂
LikeLike
You know, my Hubs is actually fairly good about putting his crap, er, stuff away most of the time (no, seriously, stop laughing). But he does have his moments. And when he has his moments I consider it a game…his game.
Sometimes it just involves a piece of paper that he’s dropped on the middle of the floor–you know, it’s obvious, not like he can’t see it. Yet it sits there forever while he just walks around it. Or sometimes it’s the rubber band off his newspaper, which he’s too lazy to walk around the counter to throw away, so he puts it on the counter. And he just leaves it there. Until I get sick of looking at it after a few days or a week and deal with it myself. And sometimes it’s some random item that needs to be moved from the kitchen to his closet, or out to his office, and it just never quite seems to get there.
Clearly this is a game that’s only fun for him. I don’t like his game. But guess what? I have a game too. It’s called Hide the Cell Phone. The Hubs has his own business and you know, he can’t live without that cell phone. It’s like an appendage that is attached to him at the hip. So when I get sick of his game, I play mine. I hide his cell phone, and he doesn’t get it back until his crap gets dealt with, by him. It’s pretty amazing how effective this game is. And hey, we both win in the end. 🙂
LikeLike
Tina ~ aaahhhhh, the game. I am incredibly familiar with this game. As a matter of fact we are playing it right now with a dime. Yes, a dime. It’s been sitting on our bathroom floor just below the tub on the far side of the bathroom for, well, I’d estimate about a month (although it could possibly be longer). It’s there, I see it, and I’m almost certain hubby has moved it at one point, but not REMOVED it. So, it continues to sit there and taunt me from the bathroom floor!
I like your theory of hiding the cell phone, but in all actuality this would create MORE work for me since he’d be begging me to come and help him look for it because we all know that a man cannot find something on his own!!
LikeLike
HA! We use to drive my mother NUTS because growing up the stairs were always covered with the stuff that my sister and I intended to take upstairs or relocate somewhere else. But the stuff never seemed to leave the stairs until mom threatened the taking away of something valuable.
She did one time take matters into her own hands when the stairs had reached an all new high of cluttered chaos…she simply made everything on the stairs disappear! I still don’t think we have gotten everything back.
Stopping by from twitter. I love your writing style, very fun.
LikeLike
Abbie ~ thanks for coming by… and I’ve actually wondered how long it would take for him to realize, if everything did indeed just disappear!!!
LikeLike
And here I thought the habit of giving inanimate objects the most improper home was an exclusive trait of my significant other! Misery loves company and I am relieved I am not alone in my grief! 🙂
LikeLike
Bella ~ I can only say I’m sorry that you have your own version at home 🙂 My sympathies!!
LikeLike
i can’t recall how i found this blog, but just wanted to let y’all know how funny this is. I admit, some days i’m too irritated at my own bf (no hubby yet) to check in.
Um, i hate to be all safety-conscious and all, but i’ve tripped on stairs before. i don’t even need something to be sitting there for me to trip. I manage quite well with carpet, tile, my own feet/shoes/socks. Anyways, be a shame to deal with a hubby with a broken leg, and lord knows it’d be worse if you had your own broken leg.
Maybe a basket sitting next to the stairs at the bottom, with a handle, to be easily carried upstairs?
I dunno, haven’t lived in a house w/ stairs in years.
Also, i vote for throwing the boxing strap things away! Sounds like a great idea to me!
LikeLike
Angie ~ you are giving hubby WAY too much credit. With a basket, there would be a new game to see just how much he could fit into the basket before he needed to move it upstairs. So instead of stuff on a few stairs, I’d have an overflowing basket cluttering the hallway at the foot of the stairs, that would, in all likelihood, sit there for weeks!!
LikeLike
I laughed the entire way through, because at every point i was thinking that “they are all the same”. BUt they could never admit it.
I do have a question for you….. and purely because i have kept my blog a secret. (It’s new, it has not found any ground yet, and i am scared it will offend someone and be the start to a terrible weekend)….. does your man ever comment?
x
LikeLike
MNB ~ Yep…. they are indeed all the same. That’s why there’s strength in numbers and we need to laugh about how absurd it can be sometimes!
And, to answer your question… hubby is probably my #1 reader of the blog, and he often comments directly on posts. Sometimes trying to defend himself, although there’s really no defense against most of his ridiculous behavior! 🙂 When I first starting this blog we talked about it just to make sure that I wasn’t going to upset him. I even offered to let him pre-read anything I wrote and I told him that he could retain veto power. He basically told me that nothing is off limits and he’s been 100% supportive. Our only rule is that I never make anything up and it’s always in good hearted fun. Although the stories are true and sometimes I want to give him a swift kick in the butt, they are mostly meant to make people laugh. And believe it or not, venting my frustrations has actually been therapeutic!!
Good luck with your new blog. I’ll swing by to check it out!
LikeLike
I just found your blog and love it! I was entirely new to the games of my hubby leaving stuff out. My father was fanantic about putting everything where it should go lol, to the point where we all had lessons on where everything should go, including where everything went in the dishwasher.
So it doesnt bother me as much as most women I suppose. I have a bad habit of leaving things where they arent supposed to be, just because I never got to do it growing up.
My favorite was always walking home from the bus stop after school and seeing things flying out of the front door of the house, and doing the big SIGH, because my room wasnt put away the way it should be.
My fathers answer, throw everything I owned into the front yard and give me a half an hour to try and get everything back in. (bed included sometimes) Ive considered doing that to hubby when clutter gets really bad at our house, BUTTTT I really dont want everything we own to sit outside for days and days. haha
LikeLike
Shelly ~ I’m so with ya.. not sure I’d want all of “our” belongings on the front lawn. Because anything that got ruined would be something that I would have to repurchase. I’ve also considered piling all of his stuff onto his side of the bed but again, this impacts me more than it would impact him! I suppose it’s a battle that we (women) cannot win!
LikeLike