Husband Clothes

This happened a few weeks ago. I have one visual symbol that I feel effectively communicates what I had to deal with that day, and it is posted above. These scissors are MY FAVORITE kitchen scissors. Oh, sorry, they WERE my favorite kitchen scissors. As you can see, however, something happened to them. Guess what that was.

The incident occurred on a day when we needed to mow. Surprisingly, that day began well despite the need for mowing part. (Usually on the days we need to mow, my husband and I almost get divorced due to his inability to help with that ONE JOB around the house.) But that particular morning, I said, “We need to mow.” And he just started getting the stuff to do it! I nearly fell into a shock-induced coma. However, I was quickly brought back into full, though perplexed, consciousness with the following 2 incidents:

1. After like 5 minutes, he says, “Alright! I’m all done mowing.” I thought, that seems way too fast, even considering the dinky size of our yard. So I go out to look. UM YEAH, figured it out–about 3 spots of grass had actually been CUT. All the rest of the grass was still 8 inches tall but LYING DOWN sideways. In short, almost nothing had even been mowed. I pointed this out, and he got an irritated look on his face and said, “Fine, I’ll mow again. But first I’m going to cut this tree back.” (Uh, correction: Omit the word “again,” Sweetie. But good idea to cut the tree back.)
2. After 10 more minutes, he came inside and said, “Well, I’m going to need to go to Home Depot.” I asked why. He held up my favorite kitchen scissors which were broken in half, and said, “Because these broke.” Apparently he had been trimming the TREE with them.

I said, “You tried to cute the TREE with my kitchen scissors???????”

His response: “Well, we don’t HAVE yard sheers. Plus those tree branches are not that big.” See. See how my life is? But that’s all fine now. I recuperated by asking myself, “Let’s pretend I am forced to choose between these. Which would be better?”:

a) a man who is a really kind husband and father but somehow breaks kitchen utensils while doing yardwork or

b) a man who could mow all of Iowa in a flash and not break a single kitchen utensil in the process, but who was mean to me and the children

Easy. I’d take the guy who’s really nice but breaks kitchen utensils while mowing. Not IDEAL, but an easy choice nevertheless. My life is pretty fun–just sometimes I have to consciously remind myself to laugh rather than cry. That’s fine.

I keep meaning to write a post about men and vision. Did you know that studies have shown that men REALLY don’t have eyes for certain types of details?

If I weren’t in such a panic over this project I have to send in by Friday, I’d research it right now and link you to a great article on this fascinating topic. BUT, for now, trust me (and overlook the fact that I’m no doctor and barely know a thing about men or marriage)–men can’t visually perceive the same details women do. In fact, basically, I think one could say it this way: Men can’t visually perceive details. This is why when they vacuum, it looks like no one has vacuumed. Same reason as when they beam with pride after fixing dinner despite the grease dripping from the kitchen ceiling and smushed food crap all over the floor–it’s not that messes don’t bother men; it goes a little deeper–they can’t even see the messes. (These examples refer to other peoples’ husbands, as my husband has never actually touched a vacuum cleaner or cooked an entire meal. But I know all about this stuff–my friends tell me stories about when their husbands try to help clean…)

ANYWAY, a while ago I posted how thrilled I was that my friend is building shelves for us that will be higher quality but cheaper than IKEA shelves. He did so. We’ve had our wonderful new shelves for well over a week now. They are beautiful and I LOVE them sooooo much.

Several days ago, I mentioned to my husband that we’d gotten the shelves. Granted, this was a quick conversation, and he seemed preoccupied. But whatever. We’re busy, as you probably are–there’s just not always time for hour-long updates about stuff like furniture. Also note that the shelves are in storage closets. But the one of these closets is RIGHT BY OUR FRONT DOOR. And I left the closet doors wide open for 4 days so my husband could get a look when he came home (still very late). Not to mention, all of the junk that had been in the middle of our living room floor suddenly disappeared because it went onto our beautiful new shelves.

So, after literally 3-4 days of me beaming over our new shelves, my husband IM’s me, “So, did he bring the shelves yet?”

This is a man whose JOB is adding visual details to MOVIES. Do you find that scary? You would if you kind of counted on his income to pay your rent. But that’s okay. We have my income as well. Just as back-up, that’s reassuring.

Hm. I’m feeling very puzzled and confused. But kind of on a love-my-husband high at the same time. I have very vague memories of my husband’s awesome cooking skills from about 10 years ago during our dating phase. My husband is such a great cook–or should I say “was.” Is cooking like riding a bycicle, and you don’t forget how to do it even after 10 years of not even turning on a stove eye?

Oh, let me not exaggerate. My husband has cooked several times over the last 10 years. But only for himself and on a very rare Saturday for the boys–and this involves nothing more extravagant than a scrambled egg. In fact, I can just say it this way: Over the last 10 years my husband has cooked, but only scrambled eggs, and that very rarely, and NEVER for me.

So what’s Mr. Romantic doing at 11pm as I’m working at my computer bringing me a VERY DELICIOUS OMELET with sliced bread and sliced tomatoes on the side??? He had to walk upstairs to do this. [Right here, new readers please note: Despite how this all sounds, my husband is a very kind man, and I’m a kind lady. We’re both just kind of in the stone ages when it comes to sharing housework.]

And then I, in a very extremely nice voice, was kind of like “Wow. Thanks a lot! Hey, um, are you looking to have um [how can I phrase this on blog]…to do reproductive activities?” Seriously, he looked so surprised. I am sure he only cooked to be kind. But why? Why do husbands suddenly realize they need to be attentive? Does he have a girlfriend telling him he needs to be attentive?

No, definitely not–I did the monthly cell phone-slash-wallet check and *67 (if you do that, the person getting the call can’t see your number on their phone), call all unfamiliar numbers on husband’s cell phone. I found only two unfamiliar numbers, and both people who answered were males–so sorry I hung up on them!!! He he he–can’t really explain how I am checking to be sure they’re not my husband’s girlfriend, especially since they’re obviously his guy friends–boy that’d make BOTH of us look weird, how embarrassing! [One more note for new readers: I’m SO not the jealous type, but when your husband works from 9am till 3-5am for 4-5 weeks, you start feeling that you need to check wallets and cell phones just in case–but see, I only checked once in a month. I could be SO much more diligent. But too busy.]

But back on track: I bet my husband is afraid I’m going to die when I give birth in a month–no, that sounds more like me. No, I say it’s just his great love of babies and that I’m about to have a third one for him. That’s a wonderful trait for a husband to have, but how great to get all this attention lately too! I’m basically in heaven right now, both from good food and good husband.

PS. YES, I DO REALIZE that I am probably too easily pleased. I mean, the first omelet in 10 years could have been husband cooking once or twice a week for 10 years…But how does one force oneself to be NOT happy with something when she’s just thrilled? I could try to repeat over and over, for example, “I will not be happy with first omelet in 10 years. Need husband to cook at least twice a week.” But it won’t work. I’ll still feel really happy about this omelet.

So, what happens after I mow the lawn on Sunday? My husband made the situation about 80 times more volatile by purchasing and assembling the patio furniture he’s been dreaming of. Why didn’t I accompany him to the store??? This is a question that might haunt me for the rest of my life.

First of all, we have no patio. We have concrete squares I (of course) laid out and intended to put a very small table and chairs on top of at some point.

Oh, but no. My husband found a table at Costco that he’s been talking about for weeks. It sounded pretty bad. White plastic, round, round bench attached under the table. But the bench OPENS for easy sitting. This didn’t tempt me in any way whatsoever to spend the $200 this table apparently cost us.

But he kept talking and talking about it. Finally I thought, okay, it’s going to look HORRIFIC. But let’s just take a look, and then he can return it for a refund. I mean, it sounds like something you’d see in a school cafeteria or fastfood restaurant, but how bad can it be? And how big could it possibly be? Our yard is small, but he promises the table is small too. Worst case scenario, he’ll take it back to the store.

Um, no he can’t. It took him 4 hours to put that piece of crap together. He said it was so big that he had to take it out of the box in order to get it into the car. No box + 4 hours to disassemble + my husband is SO IN LOVE with the table = there is NO WAY on earth he’s returning this thing.

Please, take a look at the photo of this thing and tell me: Does this table look “great” in our yard? Would you want to climb over those benches to try to sit down? Let’s be generous and lower the bar a little: Does this table look acceptable for any home-related use?

I suspect you will say “No, it does not, Holly. It does not.” But I’m very curious. Tell me your opinion.

PS. Perhaps I’m being a LITTLE sassy by putting the table in the corner so that it stands crookedly, half on grass, half on concrete stairs. But I don’t want it to kill all that grass. Plus, in the corner, I can’t see it when I look out the windows, which helps my mood.

Last weekend was the first weekend we got to see my husband in over a month! And, ironically, the weekend was HORRIBLE. Saturday was pretty uneventful. My husband slept till 3pm, which was extremely irritating, but I was able to do my work without his help, got it all done, and moved onto Sunday.

Sunday we had much to do. And I had told my husband this on Saturday night. We have to get things arranged for the baby–he’s due in 6 weeks. As many people know, but apparently my husband does NOT know, women who are 8.5 months pregnant are not supposed to climb on high ladders, lift heavy things, or mow in 105 degree weather.

Hm. I just posted a whole long story about why I had to mow yesterday while my husband sat inside. It wasn’t interesting, and despite that my husband is a wonderful man, that story would convince you otherwise. Therefore, I’m going to let you know up front: He wanted to mow for ONCE but insisted on doing it at 6pm.

But see , I’m 8.5 months pregnant and had a trillion things I needed my husband’s help with yesterday, namely going to Costco by 6pm (when it closes)–with husband, per mucho heavy lifting. So, it’s not in any way going to work out to start mowing at 6pm–not even in a parallel universe. It’s not even going to work to mow at 3pm. And as we all know, MY HUSBAND CAN’T DO A DARN THING BEFORE 3PM.

So I got REALLY pissed off, and mowed at 12. I can’t even talk about it any further without breaking something really expensive that my husband owns. I almost divorced him on Sunday over this. I am not sure how I thought that’d work out with the baby due in 6 weeks, but somehow I felt it would be fine.

ANYWAY, my husband now claims that I didn’t explain the Costco 6pm,  million errands I needed his help with thing (though I clearly remember explaining it about 5 times before I mowed in a REALLY loud voice–even all of our neighbors heard it, that’s how loud my voice was, and I was yelling about it as I mowed. So I’m not sure how my husband missed that. After all, he was sitting on the couch in the living room, which is divided from the yard only by a screen door, which is very easy to hear through.)

But in his defense, he did BELIEVE he intended to mow at 6pm and he does BELIEVE I failed to explain why that wasn’t going to work out.

Whatever. The lawn is now mowed. We are not divorced. That is a miracle, but it is true. I am still kind of fantasizing about moving to my Granny’s house and having a homestead with a big garden, cows, pigs, chickens, and never seeing my jerk husband again. And marrying a really hot country guy who ALWAYS mows and NEVER wears a shirt and who …

Sorry, gotta stop. I now need to write one additional post, which will include a somewhat hideous photo (in my opinion), and which unfortunately also relates to the lawn.

I’m looking so forward to this weekend! It will be great to have so much family time, but I am sure my husband and I will get on each other’s nerves. To prepare, I read about men’s brains.

This information is taken from the book What Could He Be Thinking? by Michael Gurian. The book is based on 20 years of neurobiological research. The book is all about different chemicals and activity levels in parts of the male and female brains.

Why Husbands Tense Up When Wives Just Want to Talk
Women have 15% more blood flow and neural pathways to verbal-emotive brain centers than men. For this reason, having a conversation, especially one that inspires emotion, can increase oxytocin levels. Oxytocin makes the female brain feel relaxed and connected. However, it makes the male brain “wake up.”

When the male brain is in a restive state, most of its activity is centered in the brain stem. The brain stem does not connect well to the frontal lobes at the top of the brain–where the verbal-emotive processing goes on.

So, in a nutshell, after work, both males and females aim to relax. Talking helps women relax. But for men, conversation stimulates chemicals and parts of the brain to work, rather than to relax. How evil of nature.

Why Men Ignore Their Wives When They Get Home From Work
When men get home from work, they want to rest, just like women do. What does help the male brain enter a restive state? Fixing electronics and channel surfing. I’m serious.

Why Men Watch TV at Defeaning Volumes + Can’t See Stuff In the Fridge
Women’s brains take in more sensory data than men’s brains. So women see, hear, smell, and feel more strongly than men. So, this is why men need to watch the TV at FULL BLAST and why they can’t see stuff in the refrigerator when they’re staring right at it. Also why the many messes they make don’t bother them at all–their brains don’t take these visual details in as women’s brains do.

So, over this nice long weekend, I guess if I want my husband to relax, I need to try not to talk to him, encourage him to channel surf as he ignores me, and try to understand that he simply can’t see all of the messes he creates.

PS. On a serious note, does anyone know of an organization that benefits families of fallen soldiers? If so, please email me! Also, here is a touching site www.anysoldier.com–it tells how you can send a letter to service men and women who don’t often get mail but need it.

Oh, I just realized I accidentally lied. I have said numerous times that my husband literally doesn’t do one household chore. Actually, there is one chore-related type thing he does–he puts his clothes into the laundry basket rather than on the floor, on the bed, or in other places as I have heard that many men do.

See, this is one advantage to having a husband who wears the same outfit up to 10 or more days in a row–clothes on the body don’t go in the floor! YES, he actually does wear the same thing every day, and he has a good job in the movie industry and for some reason, this doesn’t bother anyone.

I’ve learned to see this as kind of a plus, since it saves me so much time that I don’t have to spend doing laundry, not to mention the money we don’t have to shell out on laundry detergent! So what’s the problem? The only problem is what he does to the laundry before it goes into the hamper. Namely his SOCKS. He insists on putting one inside another so that it forms a ball at the top of the socks like so:

Can you guess what happens when you put this into a washer, then into a dryer? Well, I’ll tell you what doesn’t happen. It doesn’t get clean, and it also doesn’t get dry. Obviously, I do sift through the basket to find them before doing laundry. But they just blend in with other stuff. No matter how many times I explain the problem and ask him to STOP DOING THIS, he refuses to stop. Pent up anger? Rebellion? I have no explanation why. (Any therapists out there who know? I won’t be able to come in, but if you can tell me why my husband refuses to stop doing things that are not difficult to stop doing, though stopping them would really help me a lot, I would pay to have you email that info to me. Thanks.)

I am including a photo of the sock ball for you here. One final very odd detail about this sockball: these are MY socks which he wore, and proceeded to shamelessly make into a sockball, which he then threw into the laundry. I wear a size 6 shoe. Do you see how stretched out these socks are? When my husband runs out of clean socks (due to sock balls), he sees no problem in resorting to MY socks.

PS. You can still order a gift for Mother’s Day. I ordered for my mother yesterday from 1800Flowers.com–you can even place an order Sunday for same day delivery. You can place an order in 5 seconds because I’ve linked you to the prettiest but least expensive options in this post.

Ladies, in case you haven’t seen this wonderful article, it shows that guys create 7 hours of housework for ladies a week. And you know it’s true because it’s in Science Daily. (This is not The Enquirer, my friends. This is real stuff that’s been studied.)

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080403191009.htm

I by no means want to say that ladies MUST be the ones to do the 7 hours of housework that guys create. However, in my situation, it will not be done if I don’t do it. I know because my husband and I almost got divorced over a 7-year fight trying to get my husband to be responsible for the dishes. For the majority of this time span, my husband didn’t have a job (not entirely his fault), but I worked full-time and attended graduate school at night. Now, if you have seen my husbands “handy work” (click here and here for examples), you can understand that I don’t particularly want him “helping me” with cleaning under normal circumstances–just when I had a full-time job + grad school (oh + pregnancy), and he was unemployed, it seemed like kind of a logical idea.

Anyway, he later got good jobs and many of them, and I finished gradschool, and the dishes no longer mattered as much. (Sidenote: My husband HAS done the dishes, meaning place them in the dishwasher, 2 times during our 9-year marriage. Neither of those times occurred during the 7 year battle.) OH, and another important detail: while most men create 7 hours of work, I think it’s safe to say that unemployed guys probably create at least 14 or 15 extra hours of work around the house. It’s simple physics: space, time, and mass. Mass in house for long time = many messes in many spaces. However, mass not in house = less time = fewer messes in fewer spaces.

Wow, I just realized that my losing the 7 year war over dishes kind of makes me an expert at something. HE HE. YES, I am the master doormat of housework. Just what I always wanted to be.

Whatever. I’m good a lot of stuff besides being a master doormat. Like Russian language and living in Moscow as an illegal American immigrant for 3 years. (I was young and stupid.) How many housework doormats can say THAT, hu??

***Mother’s Day is on May 11–one month. Here are links to Shutterfly, for gifts from photos. I order their photobooks every year–25% off is a GREAT deal!***

There is a disturbingly uncanny phenomenon that happens in our home about once every 4-6 weeks. I clean the bathroom big-time about once each month. (YES, that’s rare. SORRY. But that isn’t the disturbing part.) I’m talking about the Ajax comes out, tub gets scrubbed, floor and baseboards–it all gets a major overhaul. It takes like 4 hours. That bathroom sparkles and shines when I’m done, and it feels like spring every time I walk into that bathroom.

Here’s where things get psychic (or mean). It just so happens that my husband SHAVES about once every 4-6 weeks (hence his similarity to Grizzly Adams described here, till he shaves and is bald again.) SO, how is it that for each time he has shaved during our 9 years of marriage, he chooses the morning after my 4-hour bathroom scrub down? To be sure the psychic element is clear, I want to phrase this very precisely: When I don’t clean the bathroom, my husband doesn’t shave. When I DO clean the bathroom, my husband DOES shave the very next morning. For 9 years, he has done this like clockwork.

It may be important to mention that for the small, in between bathroom cleanings (Windex on the sink, mopping around the toilet–hi, 3 guys live here, gross), the shaving does not occur. Lazyhusby, are you out there? Please tell me why this happens. But I’m not feeling picky here–any husby (husband), just tell me why you think this takes place. Is my husband psychic? Is he just mean? Or is this some type of subconscious thing, kind of like right after you change the kitty litter, kitty immediately must let it rip…?

PS. I just realized, I may need to clarify for guy readers: The reason this is ironic is because hair on multiple surfaces is very difficult to clean up. Therefore, each time you shave, a pretty major bathroom cleaning must follow. (Yes, I know, you “clean it yourself.” But I think it’s safe to say that most ladies have to finish the job off. And by “finish off,” I mean “redo completely.”) Please note that your efforts do make the job easier and are greatly appreciated, which is probably why you don’t get griped at much for this, despite that it’s irritating. It’s just kind of an irritating fact of life that’s not your fault.

P.S.S. Every heard of “vacuum electric shavers”? Well, you need to. Here’s one below–4 stars, 190 customer reviews. Looks like a winner. I’m buying one.

Well, looks like it’s that time again. The grass has grown completely out of control. I keep thinking my husband will mow it (as he promises to do it every weekend), but no. Well, what did I expect…I was the one who single-handedly layed out this grass in the form of sod, after all. By the way, I was nearly lying down on the ground (okay totally lying down) when I snapped this artistic photo. Yes, that’s extreme, but I strongly felt that lying down would provide the best possible view of the length of the grass.

I suppose I should just go ahead and accept it right now: if the lawn is going to be mowed, I will probably be the one doing it…Wonder what would happen if I never mowed it? (This is not rebellion, as it would in no way influence my husband to mow–I’m actually just curious what would happen–like, would it STOP growing at some point?) I might just do that instead of mowing. It’ll be kind of like a research project.

I don’t expect my husband to do much housework. BUT garbage and mowing are his jobs. As you can see, this in no way means that he DOES them. (And, yes, I have told him. Crying, screaming, cursing, asking nicely–none of it matters. One year, we almost get divorced over housework, but that’s a story for another day. I’ve grown weary. It’s much easier just to simply have very low standards.)

PS. I keep hearing about this monkey grass stuff. I think ALL of our grass might be monkey grass. It grows really fast and in big clumps. Does this sound like monkey grass? Does it look like monkey grass? (By the way, the really tall thing in the foreground is just a weed. Also, all of the greenery around the flower garden are weeds.)

*Remember, MOTHER’S DAY is coming up on MAY 11. See ads on the right to places that have GREAT gifts as well as GREAT sales right now.*