Marriage Is Knowing Your Spouse Better Than He Knows Himself (or his shoes!)

Hello!  I’ve missed you all.  It’s been an insane holiday season filled with family time, illnesses and WAY too much work.   Perhaps you’ve enjoyed the respite from my nutso stories or maybe, just maybe, you’ve been missing me ….. a little bit??

 

Either way, I stole some time from a long list of other things I should be doing to write a post today.

 

I’ve written many times about how difficult it seems to be for men to find things in their own home.  And I’m not talking about the silver pie server that makes an appearance at one dinner every 5-6 years.   Or the cookie cutters that only come out at Christmas time – you know, the ones that hubby probably doesn’t even know we own… even though he partakes in consuming probably 85+% of the cookies, lovingly cut with these and painstakingly decorated each holiday?   I’ve shared stories about him not being able to find things in the pantry that are RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIS FACE.  I’ve blogged about the mysteriously missing cable modem.  And, I’ve also begrudgingly showed you a picture of a closet where misplaced & “lost” items go to die.

 

I’m always baffled about how most men (more than I can count in my own life) have ZERO idea where many things go.  This is showcased by the miraculous day they empty the dishwasher.  When the stars align, Mercury is in retrograde and they have a moment of complete love, helpfulness, craziness and decide to partake in a household chore (GASP!).  And then, stay with me ladies  – you all know this moment – they stand proudly next to a pile of items they’ve removed from the dishwasher and placed on the counter only to declare that they’ve gone as far as they can with this task because “they have no idea where the rest of the items go….”.  All the while, simultaneously waiting for a pat on the back for all the help they’ve just provided you!!  ****SIGH*****

 

But what’s even more perplexing to me is how they sometimes seem to lack knowledge of many of their own things.  I mean heck, it’s one thing to not know about kitchen items (apparently MY domain – even though I don’t have recollection of accepting this domain as mine).  But, when they forget that they own something, forget where they put their favorite shirt, or belt, or tool… it just doesn’t compute for me!

 

So, take this example and help me to understand.

 

Over the holidays we decided to have some family pictures taken as a surprise gift for my parents.  Mostly grandchildren pictures but we did a few full family shots.  And, like any dorky family picture, we decided to get all matchy-match.  You can groan if you want – Hubby sure did!   Anyhow, part of the plan for our outfits was for everyone to wear brown shoes.

 

So, hubby gets his “brown” shoes and puts them on.  He’s ready to go.

 

I look at his feet and I’m like… “Uhm hon?  Those shoes aren’t brown.”  To which he replies… “sure they are!”.

 

What’s with men and colors?  The shoes he has on are just simply not brown.  Maybe greenish, or some weird dark grey with a bizarre tint to them.    Even now, I’m not 100% sure I can define the color of the shoes he had on.  BUT, they were not brown.

 

So I say to him… “just go grab shoes that are actually brown”.   He gives me that look…. you know the look, the one that says “you’re crazy lady – I don’t know what you’re talking about” look.   Then he speaks, “These are the closest I have to brown… these will have to do”.  So I say, “No, you have actual brown shoes”.  “No I don’t”,  “Yes you do”, “I don’t think so”…. (you can see where this is going).  So, I go upstairs into his closet.  I move around piles of crap, things that have been missing for years (if you don’t remember how he keeps his closet – or drawers – check HERE & HERE) and lo and behold I find brown shoes… and then another pair of brown shoes.  I bring both pairs downstairs.   He looks at them…. “Hummmpf” he says, “I guess I do have brown shoes”……………………………

 

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When You’re Right….. You’re Right? (Unless You’re Inside Out?)

In the almost 5 years I’ve been blogging there is one recurring topic that I can’t quite seem to stay away from.    In case you’re a new reader I’ll share just a few posts with you (HERE, HERE , HERE & HERE)

 

Most people dislike 4 letter words but me, nope, I like a lot of 4 letter words. … words like Love, Food, Hugs & Beer (and probably too often, just about all of those 4 letter words that are incredibly inappropriate in mixed company – yep, I have a mouth like a sailor!).  It’s generally the 6 letter words that I hate.. words like, crumbs, chores, toilet,  but there is one word that can top them all….the ever-so-dreaded 7 letter word that I quite simply, just despise – LAUNDRY.

 

I hate every aspect of it.

I hate the piles of dirty laundry in the closet.  The piles of dirty laundry in the bathroom.  The piles of dirty laundry next to the bed.

I hate the sorting.

I hate the process of carrying 6 baskets of dirty laundry to the basement.

I hate dirty towels.

I hate dirty sheets.

(I hate that I’m the only one who recognizes that linens actually need laundering….)

I hate remembering that I have clothes in the dryer before they become a crumbled mess.

I hate the absurd missing sock conundrum (which has apparently extended to actual toddler clothes – since I never seem to get out what I put in)

I hate the countless hours on any given weekend where laundry looms just underneath the surface and permeates just about anything we do.

I hate the weight of the laundry as it pushes down on my shoulders if I should opt to focus on any other activity (besides laundry) during a weekend.

I hate, Hate, HATE folding all the clean laundry.

And, I hate putting all the clean laundry away.  (or leaving it to be put away on the bed only to find that hubby has moved piles of it to the dresser and will live like this for the next 2 weeks – but that’s an entirely different blog post)

 

But the one thing that I don’t HATE (or at least not in the way I hate everything noted above) is the need to flip inside out laundry to be right side out.  I know this is the nemesis of Mom’s around the world.  And I know that many a woman has instilled a laundry rule… that you get back laundry exactly-the-way you put your laundry into the basket (assuming it makes it into a basket).  And, perhaps, when my toddler becomes a teen, I will be instituting this exact same rule (ok – it’s likely I probably will) BUT, for now.. this has never been a huge deal to me.   If I take a moment to self-analyze I think it’s because I hate the laundry folding process so much already, that there’s virtually no way to make it worse for me.  Inside out – Or right-side-out  folding… they both pretty much suck!  So, while I may grumble under my breath as I flip t-shirts to be right-side-out… I’m grumbling because I’m folding laundry… not because 50% of the load is inside out.

 

Which makes where I’m headed below highly humorous to me.

 

2 weeks ago hubby did a load of laundry.  WHAT??  You may be saying……  So, I’ll say it again.  Hubby did a load of laundry.   Trust me when I tell you, I’m more surprised than you are.  It probably only happened because he ran out of underwear.  And, after an interesting recent conversation, about the under-wearing habits of most men… he was probably guilted into doing a load.

 

Anyhow… after he folded his basket of laundry he decides to take a dig at me.. or, perhaps from his point of view, he decides to “point something out to me”.

 

Hubby: “Hey hon, do you know that a ton of your shirts were inside out”

Me:  “Uhhh… hmmmm..”

Hubby:  “I just wanted to let you know….”

Me:  “You did….. Huh?”

Hubby:  “Yes.  You know, it makes this task even worse when I have to right-side-out every t-shirt”

Me:  “It does, does it?”  trying to wrack my brain for the last time he did any laundry

Hubby:  “Yes.  Maybe you could take them off right-side-out before you put them into the basket?”

Me:  wondering the last time he even put clothes ‘in the basket’ “You know, most of your t-shirts are usually inside out”

Hubby:  “No they’re not”

Me:   “Hon, I hate to break this to you but you’re mistaken… almost all of your shirts are inside out”

Hubby:  “I’m positive that you’re wrong.   I’ve always been good at taking them off right-side-out.. because my Mom had a rule growing up that if you didn’t she would fold them inside out”

Me:  “ Really…. All your life you’ve been good at making sure they’re not inside out.”

Hubby: “Yep.”

 

And I just let this conversation die… in the midst of the inaccuracies in which it was becoming increasingly buried.

 

Last weekend things were “back to normal” and I did laundry.

 

As I folded the laundry, I counted the total # of hubby’s shirts…. There were 17 in total.

 

Hubby came inside from doing some yard work.

 

Me:  “Hey babe… I would never normally do this but……”

Hubby:  “Yeah?”

Me:  “Remember last week when you so graciously pointed out that I didn’t right-side-out my t-shirts?”

Hubby:  “Yes?”

Me: “Remember how you so matter-of-factly told me that you never put inside out t-shirts into the hamper?”

Hubby:  “Yep!”

Me:  “Well, I did laundry today”

Hubby “Ok….”

Me:  “And again, I would never be pointing this out if you hadn’t opened the door to this conversation……”

Hubby:  blank stare

Me:  “Well, I counted your t-shirts… there were 17 of them.”

Hubby:  “Ok”

Me:  “Do you want to know how many were inside out?”

Hubby: “I’m not sure….. Do I?”

Me: “You do.  It was TWELVE of them”

Hubby:  silence………………………..

Me: “I just feel the need to remind you again….. I have done 16,928 loads of your laundry (give or take).  And, I’ve never complained about having to right-side-out your shirts”

Hubby:  more silence……………

Hubby: “ I’m sorry.  I will try to be better”

Me:  “I honestly don’t care…. But I’m sure your Mom would be very disappointed in you.”

Hubby:  “Hmmmmmm”

 

And there you have it my dear readers……………….I will let you know how the next load of laundry goes!

 

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It’s SNOT fair!!

Wow…. You know how sometimes you blink and you’ve lost like a month of your life?  Well, that’s me right now.  I’m short staffed at work which is slowly and painfully killing me and then add to that a cute little munchkin to take care of (ok, 2 munchkins if you count hubby – who arguably is less cute, although cute in his own right….) and I have no idea where my time goes.

 

What I do know is that the tasks that used to not get done at my house because of hubby’s inability to commit (or at least align) with my timelines now take even L O N G E R…. if you can possibly imagine that.   And longer means that Christmas bags filled with gifts are still sitting in my bedroom (read HERE), laundry baskets filled with clean clothes NEVER get emptied.  A picture that I put on the side of our bathroom to get hung (oh say, about 6 months ago) still knowingly winks at me – from the floor  – every time I take a shower.    I remember a day when blogging somehow inadvertently led to action… or at least considered action by hubby.  But maybe because we’re both so busy.. and tired…. and busy…. and MORE tired and I can’t find time to blog, it’s not easy to subtlety put things on hubby’s radar.

 

But alas, all this really means is that the fairies have needed to kick into overdrive.

 

And by fairies….. (contrary to hubby’s perspective)…. I mean ME!

 

Take this example.

 

It’s allergy season at our house… which sucks!  If you don’t have seasonal allergies consider yourself incredibly lucky because it’s almost impossible to communicate how much it truly blows.  The sniffling, sneezing, nose blowing, medicine swallowing, windows open/closed debates that happen on a daily basis at our house are ridiculous.  We have loaded up on tissues and Allegra D and nasal spray and umpteen other remedies so we can try to make it through this season with minimal discomfort.

 

So, I’m in the kitchen the other day and I go to the counter to get a tissue….. but…………. The tissue box is no longer there.  Shocking, I know.

 

So, I go to the bathroom to blow my nose… thinking to myself…. “Self, don’t replace the tissues.  Hubby used the last one.  He will undoubtedly need more.  He will replace the box that he emptied.”  And then the part of me that lives in reality said …. “Self, you’re delusional.  Replace the tissues.  You will absolutely need another tissue long before that box gets replaced.”   And then the hopeful side of me responded…. “No.  He’s going to prove you wrong.  He WILL replace the tissues”

 

And then, like 4 days passed.   No tissues.

 

And every dang time I walked to the counter…. forgetting that there are no tissues there, I curse under my breath as I reach into thin air grasping for a non-existent tissue box.

 

And then, one day hubby was standing in the kitchen as I walked to the counter for a tissue (apparently I’m not good at un-training myself).  But this time, rather than silently have a conversation in my head I decided to talk to our son.   “Mini-hubby” I said, “When you get older, please, oh please, make sure you learn how to do things like this for the people around you.  Daddy doesn’t care that mommy has snot running down her face……”    And hubby, who is obviously listening, perks up and says…. “Oh, there’s no tissues?”.   “No honey, there’s no tissues…. Because you emptied them days ago and didn’t get a new box”.

 

With a straight face hubby responds….. “But tissues replace themselves, I don’t understand why there not there?”  “Uhm, no hubby, tissues actually don’t replace themselves”.  I sigh a long sigh….. “Fairies??”  he asks, seemingly perplexed.  “Nope, the fairies don’t do it either”.  “Hmmmmm…..” he thinks for a moment (you can see the wheels turning in his head).   Then he comes to a brilliant conclusion.   “I will get new tissues”  he declares.  And then, without skipping a beat he asks me….. “where do we keep the tissues???”

 

(We’ve lived in this house for 8 years.  The extra tissues have had the same storage spot for 8 years.  Hubby has no idea where that storage spot is)

And that your honor, is why I had to kill him.

 

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“Happy Feet!”

I hate washing dishes…..

 

Not nearly as much as I hate washing floors, but I do harbor a pretty strong distaste for this particular chore.    And we do have a dishwasher, so it’s not like there are a ton of dishes that need hand washing but, in my opinion, even 1 pan or  1 Tupperware container is too much.    Thankfully most items make their way to the dishwasher (thank god we have one of these or I might be using disposable pot & pans)  But regardless this is a task that I despise…………….

 

Now, if they’d only make an automatic floor mopping device, we’d be in good shape…. But, I digress…………….

 

Anyhow, this particular chore aversion has always been lessened by the fact that hubby doesn’t mind doing this chore.  Now don’t misunderstand, he doesn’t like it, but he does like playing with water (like any child) and he does like to eat – and he DOESN’T like to cook – so, the natural progression was for him to take on the bulk of hand washing dishes, when necessary.  And, they lived happily ever after.

 

UNTIL

 

The baby arrived.

 

As you may know, babies are messy.  There’s more laundry than I ever imagined could come from the addition of one tiny human.   And consequently, there’s a heck of a lot more dirty items in general.  One item in particular is bottles.   It’s amazing how quickly they multiply in our sink, and if you blink too quickly, you may have 6 bottles at the end of the day…. And there they sit; all beckoning, and taunting, and giggling amongst themselves at all they work they have in store for you.

This is only 2 bottles!

You see, like any clueless new parents, we wound up with bottles that have like 426 different tiny pieces that all must be assembled, in puzzle like fashion, to come together to prevent excess gas intake, or maybe it’s to improve baby IQ, or perhaps solve global warming.  Ok, I’m not really sure why there are so many dang pieces.  But what I AM sure of, is that cleaning these mother f’ers is a royal pain in my posterior region (and just for the record, these are Dr. Brown’s bottles -and they DO work, even though I’d pay millions of dollars for a full-time bottle washer).     Each tiny, individual, piece must be disassembled, washed, brushed, poked, scrubbed and violated in a way that only long tubular bottle pieces can, to ensure they are clean for our little one.   And, my friends, these puppies can’t go in the dishwasher.  I mean, sure, they can in fact go in the dishwasher but…. once you take them out of the dishwasher, you have to put them back into the sink to clean them.   Cause, with all the contraptions they sell to help make bottles dishwasher-cleanable… the only thing that really works is a bit of elbow grease, some pruny hands and about 4 hours in front of the sink.  Not to mention the day when I tried to wash them in the dishwasher and the bottles all came out with a nice orange-y, reddish hue.  Thank you Mr. Marinara sauce.

 

So, this brings me to the “meat” of my blog post.  What you just read was really just the back story.  And, you were wondering up to this point….. why the heck is she talking so much about baby bottles????  So, stay with me people.

 

As I mentioned earlier, hubby is our in-house dishwasher.  That is of course until the baby arrived – since bottle washing is so daunting – I’ve had to suck it up and wash bottles……… which, in case you were wondering, I still despise!  And, in case you missed it, I will remind you again… washing bottles SUCKS and takes f-o-r-e-v-e-r.   So hubby, in his infinite wisdom, says to me.  “Do ya think you could buy us a kitchen mat to stand on while we wash dishes for 6 hours a day?”  And being the loving wife I am, I respond “Why yes hubby, I certainly can”.  And then off I went to help give us comfy place to stand in front of the sink.    And, if I do say so myself, I found a rockin’ kitchen mat – if you can, in fact, use that sort of terminology to describe a kitchen mat.

“The best thing to ever set foot on!”

This mat is cushy, cozy, comfy and maybe even kick-ass (I was going for another “c” word there – but I ran out of adjectives).  You see, the mat is made of memory foam, and when you stand on it, your feet just melt into it and are nicely cushioned to provide some otherwise not-so-present-comforts, for your tiny toes, while you stand in front of the sink and work your way through your 300^th bottle part.  So, this mat sat in place for a day or so before hubby assumed the position to tackle the day’s chore.  And, when he stepped on to the mat, his toes began singing, his lower back started smiling and his mouth started saying….. “holy crap, this is the best thing I’ve ever stood on!!”  And then, in true hubby fashion, he needed to expound on his statement with some of the following:

 

“My feet have never been so happy”

“Why don’t they make shoes out of this material?”

“Every floor, everywhere, should be made of this stuff!”

“This is seriously the best thing I’ve ever felt on my feet!!”

“I’m never moving out of this spot”

 

And finally…. “ We need these mats ALL OVER the house”

 

What he doesn’t realize is that I’d NEVER put that material all over the house…….

I have him right where I want him.  In front of the sink, poised to wash bottles, and never wanting to move.   I’m not nearly as dumb as I look…………………and perhaps, with a little luck,  some incredibly comfy feet, and an equally happy hubby……….. I’ll never have to wash a bottle, ever again!  🙂

 

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It’s A Closet… No, A Coat Rack….. Uhm, No, It’s A Kitchen Table

It’s Springtime. The birds are chirping, the flowers are blooming and yep, it’s raining.  This should be the time of year where you start stowing away your winter clothes and transitioning your drawers to bathing suits and shorts but this year it’s been oddly cold.  And, given the mild winter we had, is pretty dang annoying.

 

BUT, you know what else is more dang annoying?

 

The fact that both my kitchen & dining room tables have been showcasing their multitasking ability as coat closets for WAY too long.

 

Here’s the kitchen.

Please note the one coat dangling on the floor……  And please also note, the repair kit for the lawn mower that’s been sitting on the table for upwards of 2 weeks now.

 

Here’s the dining room.

Yes, that’s 2 more of hubby’s coats.  Resting peacefully until the next time they might be needed.

 

Much like the mind-boggling phenomenon of passing the dishwasher to put dirty dishes into the sink OR the mystifying 1/2 job of putting items on top of the counter, above the drawer where they belong OR the difficult task of placing empty soda cans into the trash,  hubby must walk at least 15 feet past our coat closet to put his coats on these chairs.  And then, they seem to live there for the season.  Even when I finally cave and put them away, while cleaning for the cleaning lady, they eventually find their way back to the chairs.  It’s a never-ending, no-win, battle for me.

 

I can’t wait until it’s warm enough to put the coats away for good…. at least I’ll have coat-free tables for about 4-5 months!!!

 

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It’s A Season Of Change

Well, it’s almost officially Springtime again.  The time when you look around your house and think about cleaning, purging & organizing.  The time when you look around your yard and discuss shrubbery, weeding & mulch.  It’s also the time when the man in your life realize that his “chores” for the year are about to begin since he’s been slumbering and hibernating all winter as you continued to mop floors, clean toilets and wipe whiskers out of the sink.  As I’ve mentioned before, men’s chores are seemingly seasonal… they last for about 4-5 months when the grass needs to be mowed and then they must rest for 7-8 months from all their hard work.

 

So…. instead of rejoicing the new season and celebrating the opportunity to start anew they start grumbling about all the work that lies ahead of them.

 

I even made the mistake of mentioning a possible yard sale for the Spring and hubby’s response was simply….. “you really must hate me, huh?!”  (and, if you don’t remember what a debacle the last yard sale was please read HERE or HERE).

 

My mind is already whirling with all the activities we should do.    I have one weekend reserved for cleaning out the garage.  I have another weekend mentally booked to build a new gazebo at our pool.  Then there’s the closet purging, and the planting of flowers,  power washing the house, and (DEEP BREATH) shopping for a patio set, shopping for plants, shopping for other stuff we might need, that I’m unaware of right now.

 

You want to know what’s on Hubby’s list.   Motorcycle rides, beer consumption, tv watching, motorcycle tinkering, more alcohol consumption and even longer motorcycle rides.

 

You may be concerned that our agendas clearly don’t align.    That’s because I’m an evil, evil, woman who wants nothing more than to “ruin every free moment with chores”.  Yep, that’s me…..  a Life Ruiner.  A slave-driving, chore-master who doesn’t understand that a household chore can be delayed for WEEKS if the weather is nice enough for a motorcycle ride.

 

Silly, silly me.

 

It never ceases to amaze me that men can cling so vehemently to their carefree, responsibility-free youth, that they miss the fact that they’ve grown into adults while they weren’t looking.  Surprise boys…  You can’t own a (clean) home, have a (happy) family and not look like the trashy neighbor if all you want to do is ride on your big wheel with your buddies.

 

Now don’t get me wrong, hubby will likely tackle many of these projects with me…. some he may even take on himself, but I guarantee that it won’t be without it’s share of whining, pouting, feet stomping and perhaps even a bit of silent treatment.  So as the season’s change, two other things seem to change as well;  Hubby changes into a cranky little boy who’s favorite toy has been taken from him until he cleans his room.  And I change into a wifely “mom” who obviously takes immense pleasure in “taking away” all the fun in his life.

 

Ahhhhh….. I just love the Springtime!

 

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