Am I Somebody?

As I have mentioned more than once, my dear hubby is one of those that, for some reason I fail to understand, believes that there are actually creatures in the world whose job it is, to be the sweep on his trail of life. Invisible uniformed maids? Clones of tinkerbell? Aliens maybe? I have no idea who he thinks is actually going to wash those dishes, pick up those clothes or finish that 62nd project that he chose to start on a Sunday at 4:30 . You would think that after all these years he would come to realize that it sure as hell ain’t gonna be me!! But still he clearly thinks ‘Somebody‘ will step in. 

After all, ‘Somebody‘ does everything.  Good or bad.  You know the lines — we’ve all heard them:  “Well, I couldn’t find it because SOMEBODY put it in the wrong place… “;  “I was going to do that but SOMEBODY didn’t do this …”;  “SOMEBODY must have moved it … “, “SOMEBODY needs to fix that …”, “SOMEBODY needs to clean that … “,  “SOMEBODY should really … ”

BLAH BLAH BLAH … SOMEBODY!!!.   Now who do you suppose is SOMEBODY?  Sure as hell better not be me either.

My Project Manager

Of course there are two ways to look at the husband who likes projects — with amazement and awe, as in “Oh honey, I’m so lucky to have a fabulous hubby like you who takes care of everything” or with fear and resignation, as in “Ahhh crap, here we go again!!”.  Mine lies somewhere in the middle, as in “Great idea! (heavy sigh). Shame it will take F^%$#ING FOREVER to be finished”.  

As I type, I can look out the window and see the huge pile of branches, sticks and clippings that now block the way from the front door to the car  and cover most of our front yard. It was sunny this weekend and my hubby, full of enthusiasm and clippers in hand, decided to do a little trimming.  Sadly, and not surprisingly, the project plan didn’t included anything other than chop, chop, chop.  Clearly the garden gnomes, cousins to the dish fairies, were to be on the clean-up crew.  No surprise that dusk came all too quickly and then it rained all day Monday and is snowing today — not sure who Mother Nature is trying to piss off more — him or me.  So bottom line, the stuff is all now all over the place, I have to get to the car via the street, and experience tells me that it probably won’t look any different a week from now.  Well, at least the bags of seed and fertilizer and other yard bits that have been sitting there for a month will have company. They’ll need it, ’cause he’s already talking about digging up the back yard.  

Someday I’ll post pictures of us on our wedding day on his “restored” (wink wink) wooden sailboat. These are some of the captions: “Oh can someone just grab that piece of sandpaper that’s stuck to my dress … careful not to step in the varnish … don’t worry that’s just chipped paint, it won’t stain …”

More from Moira

Another hilarious tale from my friend Moira. This could have happened in my house ANY day! Thanks for the giggle Moira. 

I Love Him but Here’s Exhibit A

This past Saturday we had a million and one things to do. We were hosting 16 girls at a Kids Choice Awards Slumber Party, Molly had soccer practice and Liam had a birthday party. Not to mention we needed to clean the house from top to bottom for the party (missing that cleaning lady yet again). And of course the usual parenting routines of making sure the kids get up, dressed, find soccer clothes and equipment, wrap present and make card, be nice to each other and the dog, say no to drugs and become productive members of society. So with soccer practice looming at 10:00am and the clock striking 8:45am as the first eye in the house opens the love of my life rolls over and says, “I think I’ll go for a run.” Mind you he hasn’t exercised in like 6 weeks but thinks the start of a marathon parenting day would be a good time to go for a run!!! Speechless I watch as my very own Steve Prefontaine dresses and disappears for his run.

“Is he kidding me?” races through my head as the door slams shut. Only a man could wake up on a day like today and think (1) I really need some “Me Time” and (2) actually go out and do it. I don’t know whether to be completely impressed or mind rattlingly furious though I am leaning toward the latter. Since I don’t have the luxury of doing anything else I start my day. Wake the dead (oops I mean kids), clean the dog’s pee spot (our fault for sleeping so late – note here that Runner Boy either stepped directly in or deliberately over the pee spot and it is still here), make breakfast, locate missing soccer cleats, find matching socks, wrap birthday present, oversee card making for the Kindergartner (“B-I-R-T-H-D”-“no D points the other way”- “no it’s not ruined” – “OK fine start again” – “B-I-R…”), find soccer ball, make tight but not too tight ponytails, and breathe.

In comes Runner Boy. He heads straight over to me and gives me a huge kiss. Then says “Thanks I really needed that I’ll take over here. You go take a nice long hot shower.” Yeah right? Here’s what really happened:

In he comes and heads straight over to his IPhone to check email then unbelievably hops on his laptop. I finally boil over when I see Facebookpop up on his screen. I very calmly say, “For the record this will be Exhibit A in court.” This is a common phrase in our house in reference to our imaginary divorce proceedings. It is quite useful in getting the “you’re-F’ing-pissing-me-off-right-now” point across. As dawn breaks on marble head he understands the enormity of our looming day and giggles as he says, “Hey, I’ll drop them off if you start in on the cleaning.” Blatantly taking the least painful of the day’s co-parenting routine I am yet again impressed by the workings of the male mind. I really must take lessons someday.

Rule #457B – Silent morning

Being a Mom to two kids and a wife to one husband, is usually more like being Mom to three kids, and sometimes feels like being Mom to 13 kids. So, as I am sure you can all appreciate, I really really love the few moments of silence that I get.  If I’m in the car alone, sometimes don’t even turn on music because I love the silence so much. Equal to my love of silence, is my hatred for mornings. I have never been good at hauling myself out of bed and despite mastering the skills during those little-kid years, I still hate it. Ask my mother or my husband or anyone who has ever lived with me — I am simply not my sweet adorable self in the early AM. 

So combine my love of silence with my hate for mornings and ask yourself why you why the hell you would get in my way at 5:45AM????  I’m sorry but  you’re just looking for trouble and if I keep spitting nails when you speak to me during what should be my 10 minutes of peace, why don’t you learn a lesson and go hide in the closet for a few minutes.

A couple of mornings a week I meet the girls for a 6AM run. I know, it’s as dumb as it sounds but hey, I can eat that much more chocolate at 3pm if I do the run. So I get up with just enough time to scramble into clothes, have a drink, check the temperature and get my shoes on. It’s a very predictable and treasured routine that I have had for years and, like a 3 year old, my little routine helps me to be civil to the girls when I meet them on the street.  

But every now and again, LIKE TODAY, my better half (a morning person) is up and gets in my face and tries to bend my routine. No don’t check the weather on-line for me or pour me a glass of water or even say Good Morning!!  Of course it’s totally innocent and he’s only trying to be nice but he keeps going down the same road and falling in the same hole of expecting me to be sweet and nice and that is just not gonna happen. So what I don’t get is how come we have to explain the rules to them time and time again?  Rule #457B — Silent mornings … PLEASE!

The Pile

The Pile is one of those things that I have worked very hard at trying to forget. The Pile is a perfect time to borrow from the husband’s toolkit and apply the “ignore it and it will go away” tactic. Not that I haven’t been clear that I hate the Pile — I have been very vocal in describing my feelings about it. “Could you clean up the G.D. #*%$#@ Pile!!! .. NOW”   None-the-less, the Pile lives on.

So on those very rare occasions when I make the brave move to bring the vacuum into that foreign land known as ‘upstairs’, I begin steeling myself to come face to face with the Pile. Our bedroom is set-up so that one side of the bed (HIS side) is just far enough away from the wall for someone squeeze in and get into bed.  It was never intended as a closet or a makeshift laundry basket, much less home to the Pile. Still, when I work up the courage to bring my beloved Dyson to his side of the room, I have to be prepared to find a variety of well worn socks, t-shirts, underwear, newspapers and God knows what else that gets discarded in the Pile when he crawls into bed every night. What amazes me is that he can dump it all there, piece by piece, night after night and get up in the morning and walk over it as if it’s not there. What the hell? Is that the whole selective male blindness thing again? 

Well, not unlike his belief in the dish fairies, I can only assume that he expects that it’s the laundry fairies who step up and handle the Pile. Fortunately, I have now figured out a way to save those little darlings some work.  I wonder how long it will take hubby dear to realize, like I did, that not only is the Dyson a fabulous vacuum, it is also a very fine bulldozer.

Take my hoarding husband …please!

This comes from a great blog about home renovation — can’t imagine any good tales about husband antics are going to result from that topic — HA! Check it out at http://www.deniseholtby.com.  She also writes a regular column at yourhome.ca.  

Take my hoarding husband… please!

My husband Dean may be a hoarder or he may just be practical. At this point, I’m not sure.

Of course, Dean doesn’t keep stuff just for the sake of surrounding himself with it. He keeps it because “you never know when you might need it.”

When faced with throwing out something as mundane as a rusty cookie sheet, Dean is at his most creative.

He’ll take that cookie sheet in one hand, then scratch his beard thoughtfully with the other. He’ll turn it over a few times as he considers how best to re-purpose it.

And voila. The old cookie sheet is now a perfect tray for sorting screws and other small hardware.

A woodstove that hasn’t been used in four years? Cover it in a tarp and store it in the garage. Someday we might need it.

Clothes that no longer fit? Put them in the closet. They may fit again one day.

After holding onto an item for years, Dean practically dances like a Superbowl quarterback who just scored the winning touchdown when he finally comes up with a purpose for it.

Dean also buys in bulk. Dishwasher detergent, laundry soap, toilet paper. He has shelves of the stuff stored in the basement, all labelled with the purchase date and the price. He chortles with glee when he gets a good deal.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention the chairs. Dean has a thing for chairs. We have about 30 or more of them in our little 1,200-square-foot house. They’re not comfortable chairs. Most have no sentimental or monetary value. Dean just won’t part with them.

Today, hopefully, we’re off to Canadian Tire to buy some folding chairs that can be hung on the basement wall, out of the way. The idea is to replace about eight of the big, clunky chairs Dean’s been keeping in the basement with a lighter, more portable and easy to store alternative.

That’s the idea, at least. However, I’m willing to wager that not one of the chairs currently forming an obstacle course in the basement will actually leave the house within the next 12 months. Anyone care to take me up on that bet?

Tinker-dish

We all have some silly little things in life than bug us. I hate bumper stickers, mismatched sox and dirty dishes sitting in my sink.  Even if there are dishes to be done, put them in a neat little pile beside the sink so that the sink if free. And I HATE soaking dishes even more. I do not soak. I rinse, never soak. Men however LOVE to soak. They think that dropping that bowl in the sink with a splash of water is a huge help. Not enough that the food doesn’t get completely hardened and stuck to it and then requiring total dish-doing elbow grease, just enough to be able to say “Well I was soaking it first”.  It has always amazed me that the dishes can make their way all the way from in front of the the TV or from the office desk on that long and arduous journey to the kitchen but can’t ever make that last leap to the dishwasher. What’s with that?

Well in fact there are standard answers aren’t there?  There is the often relied upon  “Well, I was just ABOUT to do that”. Really? And that’s why the milk is curdled and the raisin bran is stuck rock solid to the side of the bowl.  

My personal favorite however is “Well I didn’t know if the dishes in the dishwasher were clean or dirty”.  This always amazes me. I’m not sure if I am more stunned by the idea that it doesn’t even occur to him to open the door and look or if he truly and honestly cannot tell the difference between a clean dish and a dirty dish.  In either case, someone has to sit down with the president of the company where he works and explain that the guy who runs that department over there full of project managers, multi-million dollar budgets and a new crisis everyday, can’t figure out how to open the dishwasher or whether a plate still has food on it or not.  Surely there’s a software program out there somewhere for that?

Of course, not to be forgotten, is my husband’s standard last ditch attempt at humor when he realizes I have discovered the despised soaking dishes. “Damn — did the dish fairies not show up again?”  

The scary thing is, in his mind, the dish fairies are real.

Carpet Cleaning

So here is another one of the rhetorical questions that will never be answered. (I am starting to remind myself a bit too much of Carrie Bradshaw and the whole “I couldn’t help but wonder …” bit — but anyway here goes).  What is it with men and the whole ‘swept it under the carpet’ mentality?  How can they actually believe that if they ignore whatever the incident, problem, topic, issue is — then it will just magically go away. Do we just chalk it up to forgetfullness? Plain old stupidity? Playing dumb? What the hell — just because you choose to ignore it, it’s still there. I would love to have the faith in magic that if I just pretend that it never happened, then I will never have to talk or think about it again.  It always amazes me when we have some big  huge scrap that a few hours later he waltzes and smiles as if nothing happens. How does he not trip over the huge lump in the carpet???

So perhaps at this point, it’s obvious that I am a little more pissed than my normal light hearted self.  As background, if you haven’t read about the whole car thing then you had better check it out here. If you recall that incident, then read it again to remind yourself that my husband never should have been paroled from the doghouse after that whole debacle.

So today the mail brings the news of 3, count ’em 1,2,3 … unpaid …. yes read it again folks, UNPAID, forgotten about, ignored, swept under the under the F&^%$#ING carpet, traffic tickets. Remember the whole no-front-plate-on-the-car thing? Well apparently someone had forgotten to put their fancy new registration and insurance documents in the car too. Thus tickets #2 and #3 — all to the tune of $300+.   So instead of paying them, or going to court to have them dismissed (easy as pie I can assure you!) or even telling your wife about all three — where did said tickets land? Under the proverbial carpet. Well I think it’s time for some carpet cleaning in this household, wouldn’t you say?

Genetic Male Blindness

On Friday night we all jumped in the car to go and pick up my 10 year-old who was playing at a friends house. It was unusual that both my husband and I were there — especially as I had said not long before, “Did you want to run over there and pick him up?” and his casual reply was “No, thanks”.  Clearly I was to slow to realize that I was making the usual fatal mistake of asking, not telling– as in “Hey you! Drop the remote, get off your butt and go pick up the kid who I shuttle around 99% of the time!”  So anyway, we finally make our way to get him, drawn together by the bribe of a beer and nachos at the mall after the pick-up. 

So we’re standing in the house chatting with the Mom while my kid drags himself away from the 50-inch plasma (the kind that we DON’T have, he reminds me constantly) and even the other Mom seems amazed that my husband is there with me. So my kid puts on his coat and suddenly turns to me and says with that innocent expectation of help that boys do so well, “Mom, where’s my other glove?”  Now obviously the appropriate response to the 10 year old is not “How the hell would I know you idiot ? It’s not my glove, not my house, and NOT MY PROBLEM”  At least not in front of the other mother anyway.  So I just smile and say don’t worry it’ll turn up. My husband however, hands-on parent that he perceives himself to be and clearly looking to demonstrate his value since he’s here, gives the kid a min-speech about being responsible for his own things. How ironic is that from the man who woke me up at 5:25am to find his coat for him!! Just goes to prove that their total inability to keep track of anything is not only genetically passed on, but it’s just like color-blindness, they live in complete and total denial of the condition.

Personality Test

This is from my pal Moira (who is so totally worth a bookmark) about the brilliance of the end-of-day-decison-making by the hubby.

Here is the scenario:

You are at work. It takes you 15 minutes to get to the train and it is 6:08pm. The train leaves at 6:20pm. You have only 12 minutes. What do you do?

• Option A – Make a run for it. Literally run through the streets of Boston arriving at the station out of breath and in a sweat with the chance of making the train. You never know, you could be a really fast runner that day or the train could be a few minutes late. Stranger things have happened afterall and you never say die. If you miss it you will have to wait one hour and 20 minutes for the next train. However, you could get a bite to eat or pick out a nice book to enjoy. Maybe even call your wife with a hilarious tale of jumping over an old lady and a dog only to have in fact missed the train.
  
• Option B – Try to catch a cab. If you get one in time, you make your train. If not, you can go back to your office to wait for the 7:40. Calling your wife to let her know that you tried but it just wasn’t in the cards.
  
• Option C – Calmly accept in a Zen-like fashion that you will in all likelihood miss the train and wait patiently for the 7:40. Getting more work done and calling your wife like a thousand times to help keep you entertained.
  

Since I designed the test I get to tell you what the results mean.

Choosing Option A is the correct answer. Mostly because it is the one I would choose. You are the type of person to never give up. You would have done well on the Apollo 13 Space Flight or as a Boston Red Sox fan at anytime in the 86 years prior to 2004.

Choosing Option B would be a nice compromise. You are not the type of person to jump in the pool without at least sticking a toe in first. However, you are open to the possibility of the impossible. You just don’t think it happens all that often.

Choosing Option C. Apparently it means I married you which might just be why you need this Zen-like peace of yours. I get it. But really what the F**! are you thinking?! Get off the phone and make a run for the F’ing train!!

Men and women think so differently in our house. I don’t think I’ll ever not be surprised by this little fact of life. How did you score?

Moira, I can assure you that my better half would be a total C.  In fact he is calling me from the car right now to make his drive home pass quickly. Seems he left to late to beat the traffic.