It’s not like I was going to eat it

I recently purchased this:

A stupid expensive clear foundation-y gel, which I read an article about, and then bought during a moment of suckerdom.

Problem is that its little pump action dispenser has this tendency to projectile squirt. If you’re not careful, it’ll forcefully ejaculate the goop across the room. Like this morning, when I pressed the pump and found nothing on my fingertips. And then I spotted the glob on the bathroom door.

And it is sufficiently pricey that I honestly considered wiping it off the door and applying it to my person.

But I didn’t. This time.

People, this is exactly what happens behind the closed doors of the make-up nation. Nobody’s per-fekt.

He’s not as innocent as he looks.

Some of you (*cough*V*cough*) make little sad faces while reciting back to me some of the “things I don’t get tired of doing to my husband“. “Poor guy” you say. Envisioning his life of constant rastling torment.

And so.

I thought I would share this evening’s extremely common occurrence.

That is, I am working, and he decides he wants my attention. And there is only one way my husband wants my attention, and that is RIGHT NOW.

I must emit some sort of “on-a-deadline” pheromone, because that seems to be the only time he gets this overwhelming urge speak with me immediately.

When he gets something in his little brain that he wants to tell me about, god help us all. “Stubborn” does not begin to describe this man.

It does not matter if I tell him I only need 5 minutes to send this document/ write this email/ finish this report. If anything, that just triggers some weird panic system where he really really can’t wait. If I ask for 5 minutes of quiet, he’ll give me at best 15 seconds. Then he’ll try again. Then he’ll likely start narrating about how he’s being quiet. Then he’ll lie down on the floor next to me. Then he’ll start talking about the underside of the coffee table. Or the ceiling. Or what we should do with the light fixtures. Or imitate some noise he’s hearing (like this evening’s extended remix version of “what the cat sounds like when she’s eating wet food”).

Then I will stop and say something along the lines of “honey! for god’s sake! please please just be quiet for 30 seconds! I literally need to read this email through once and then I can hit send and you can tell me whatever you want!”

Cue a sigh. Followed by another 10 seconds of silence, and then perhaps humming, then… you name it. If I’m lucky he’ll go and practice guitar. Without his headphones on.

(He might even patter back down the hall two chords in to ask if it’s been 5 minutes yet.)

Now, bear in mind that in 10 years of being together, I don’t think a single one of these musthappenrightnow conversations has ever ever actually qualified as urgent. This evening for instance? He wanted to talk to me about espresso machines. Sometimes he wants to tell me about music theory. Or the recycling. Or what he should have as a snack.

See? Wolf in a really frustrating sheep’s clothing. He’s lucky he’s cute.

Result: Average (and how!)

I just bought a scale. Where by “bought” I mean “cashed in RBC points”.

It’s a fancy shmancy scale. Which measures water/fat/muscle/BMI/recommended caloric intake/colour chakras/outfit coordination etc.

And it made me mad. Because it seems to think that I am very very average. My water is around 50% (average), my fat is around 29% (average), my muscle is around 36% (average).

I am displeased. I do not like being average (the husband says it’s cuz I’m “contrary”). And 36% muscle is exactly the number wikipedia says is what a normal woman has. NORMAL. MY. ASS.

This may bring a new (crazy mutterer) focus to my gym time. So if you see someone over by the weights, mumbling under their breath something about “stupid goddamn 36% I’ll show you who’s 36% maybe we’ll just throw another set on there how do you like them percentages 36″…

…that’d be me.

Update: I have fully 4% less body fat when the scale is in the bathroom vs the hall. Must be a gravity pocket.

Loveiversary

Today is my loveiversary. Neologism courtesy of the husband, who coined the term to reflect that while we’ve been married for 2+ years, we’ve been together for oh so much longer.

10 awesome years of big love.

You’re the greatest baby. MWA!

Things my husband probably gets tired of saying to me

1. “No it’s not a euphemism.”

Often following up on a sentence like: “Could you please flip my spring rolls over?”

2. “That doesn’t go there.”

This is broadly applied to dishes, winter coats, appendages…

Often attached to a sentence like: “No the cat does not like it when you put your feet on her head.”

3. “Is your playlist repeating?”

See also: “I think we’ve heard that song already.”

and: “Could you put your headphones on?”

and: “Are we listening to the same three songs over and over?”

4. “I don’t think you need another coffee.”

5. “Yes of course you have one anyways, but you’ll feel sick.”

6. “No you don’t like feeling sick.”

7. “Can I have my socks now please?”

See: http://chayday.com/blog/2009/things-i-do-not-get-tired-of-doing-to-my-husband/

8. “I did eat my greens.”

OH! You thought I was just going to list off things he says when I’m being bad. Well, he’s not all cherubic like he sounds.

For ages, I picked up our plates after meals, only to finally realize a few years in that he never ever ate all of whatever vegetable was on his plate. Not. Once.

When I finally twigged in, I started giving him smaller portions. So that basically I give myself twice as many vegetables as him. The first time I did this, he tried to hand me back his plate with veggies still on it. Looking all innocent. And I was all “oh no mister, I’m on to you, I gave you half as many veggies as me, and you still didn’t finish them. This is not a percentage activity buddy, eat those peas.”

To be continued…

That, or Kermit & Big Bird’s illegitimate offspring

The husband and I were bone tired by 9pm tonight. But, unwilling to just veg out, and unable to do anything that involved synapses firing, we settled on…

…

colouring.

It was my suggestion, and I stand proudly behind it.

I dug out a (decidedly musty) Muppets colouring book. Purchased a number of summers ago for cottaging purposes. I believe the same cottage trip whose supplies also included embroidery floss, henna, and green nail polish.

This was my contribution. A space/retro pig in floods with a ‘burbs dye-job. Feel free to notice the creative license wherein I added orange tread to her shoes. I know. I’m a star.

This… was his:

God I love that man.

Sno000oow Cake 2009

Alright people. Snow cake is a go. I repeat, Snow Cake is a Go.

It’s cooling as I type, to be covered with obscene amounts of sugar icing shortly.

If your name is on this list, you have made your feelings vis-a-vis snow cake clear (in person, via text message, phone calls, emails… good lord people) and I am putting some aside for you (don’t worry, it freezes beautifully).

If your name isn’t, speak up quick cuz the cake’s not that big, and the husband will consider anything that’s left “fair game”.

* Jerry

* Patrick

* Sevaan

* Bryan

* Amy

* Matt & Matt (?)

Things I do not get tired of doing to my husband, Part III

Just a quick installment this time, since I have a work deadline that’s not going anywhere (stupid lazy deadline, why won’t you move?!).

15. Dramabush (that sounds a lot dirtier than I mean it to)
A dramabush is drama + ambush. It’s when you take a completely mundane moment, and respond with over-the-top melodrama action.

Example: We’re folding socks.
Me: *humming
Him: “What are you humming baby?”
Me: “Oh, I don’t know… nothing. Is it bothering you?”
Him: “No of course not…”
Me: “Well if it is, WHY DON’T YOU JUST IGNORE ME?! THAT SHOULD COME NATURALLY ENOUGH TO YOU!!”*
(* It’s best to round this out with some sobbing and running from the room.)

Counter-attack: He usually just waits quietly for me to come back, when my return is greeted with an “idiot” and grin + headshake.

16. “Don’t say it!”
The husband is… persistent. If it’s something he’s noticed, something he wants to say, something he wants to do. Persistent. Known in some circles as “stubborn”. Sometimes (read: often) I know exactly what he’s going to say. After 10 years, you can see through someone else’s eyes pretty accurately. You have only to follow their gaze, and you know, with absolute certainty, what’s going on in their little brain.

Like say, if you see them notice you’ve left your bag on the dining room table (again). Or that the pots and pans aren’t washed yet. Or that the letter hasn’t been mailed. You can feel the heat of their gaze and read the thought bubble that goes with it.

The thing is, I know. I know. I know the letter needs to be mailed. I know my bag doesn’t belong there. I know that it’s my turn to wash the pots. I. know. And having grown up in a family that turned nagging into a bleeding art form, I can’t bear to be reminded.

But the husband is, as mentioned, persistent. If he notices, he wants, nay, he needs, to get it out. He has noticed, and he must speak.

And I must stop him.

Sometimes it is sufficient for me to just lock eyes with him and say “I know”. But sometimes that’s not enough for him. So as I see his mouth begin to form the words, I chase it with another “I know”. And as the words start to come out, as I increase the volume on a third “I know” and add in a “don’t say it!”. And if he insists on “reminding” me of something we both know I know, it is possible that we end up in an impromptu grapple — as I try desperately to keep my hands over his mouth, and as he tries to get the words “bag” and “belongs” and “in your office” out of it.

Counter-attack: He licks my palms. Bleargh.

Counter-counter-attack: I wipe my palms off on him. Touche.

17. Suffokissing
It starts off as a nice affectionate kiss. Then whatcha do is sort of press into it. Maybe get a hand hold. As you press in, start talking. With your mouth closed. As if you’re really trying to tell the other person something, but you can’t, because they’re kissing you. You can ramp up the tone of your incoherent mumbling into sounding either irritated or insistent. If only he would stop kissing you so you could say this very important thing! Maintain liplock for full effect, especially if he tries to pull away.

Counter-attack: I believe he once got free by slipping me the tongue. Wiley bastard.

Now hiring: Halloween Greeter

Growing up, I would never have imagined it. But we are… that house.

We are the Halloween dark house. With the lights off and the blinds drawn. There is no pumpkin on the porch, and no ghosts hanging from the railings. From the street, all signs point to “no candy here, just move along”.

Does this make me feel good? No. Do I feel like a monster? Yes. And not one of those cool monsters.

The first year we lived here, I had excuses. We had just moved in. We barely had our couch uncovered, and carving a pumpkin was just not in the cards. This year, I got nuthin. I am just That Mean Lady.

It’s not that I begrudge the kids their candy. Especially given my own Halloween candy deprivation history. Long (childhood trauma) story short: our parents were health food hippies, and Halloween equaled collecting for Unicef and (where available) small boxes of Sunmaid raisins. My poor brother was left with a lifelong addiction to chocolate-covered almonds — a Sisyphean attempt to fill the sugar-shaped hole.

It’s just that I don’t want to be the one to give the kids candy. If I could leave a feeding trough of chocolate goodies at the foot of the stairs, I would. But the idea of doing the whole “oh aren’t you a cute little… whatever” makes my eye twitch and my throat close over. I was the greeter for my childhood home for years. And as a barely social creature, I guess that was my limit. I’m out. I don’t especially like kids when they’re not loitering all over my doorstep. Door-to-door solicitors in dress-up.

(As a barely social somewhat-mean creature, the idea of opening the door on an oversized teenager and saying “you’re kidding me, right?” is almost tempting enough to bring me back. Almost.)

Next year, I will try again. And by “try”, I mean try to recruit someone else to “work the door” (payment: all the tiny candy bars you can eat). Then like a patron of the arts (where by “arts” I mean “miniature KitKats”), I will buy the candy, decorate the house with Day of the Dead skeletons, then lie back on my couch watching Buffy Halloween episodes while someone-not-me makes happy sugar-filled memories for small children. Next year.

If you’re sick…

… stay home.

“Home” not being the same thing as “work from a cafe”.

I understand that there are no freshly baked goods at your place. And if you want to pop out and get one, okay fine.

But pick up a muffin and be on your merry.

“Pick up a muffin” not being the same thing as “spread out your papers”.

Or “settle in for a conference call”.

Or “run a meeting for the next half hour”.

If you’re in a cafe hacking up a lung, I have deathstare for you. If you treat a public coffee shop as your personal boardroom, I will look the other way if they spit in your latte.

But put “noxious” and “obnoxious” together, and there is not an eyeball hairy enough for you.