Tag Archives: men

10 Things that Confuse Me Today

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  1. Why a dog will stand and bark for 20 minutes at a napkin ring that has rolled under the table in the dining room until I come and tell him it’s okay, I see it.  Then it is, apparently, fine. 
  2. Why the Goose can drink six Mountain Dews a day, a sleeve of cookies and three giant meals and remain slim while I exist on two celery sticks, one saltine and one chardonnay.  Seems downright unchivalrous. 
  3. Why people are interested in celebrities.  I don’t get it.  When I have been forced to watch TMZ, I don’t know anyone except Donny Osmond and Cher.  How do people keep up with these HoneyJerseyHousewifyboo people and WHY? Isn’t life interesting enough right outside our doors, if not quite as trashy? 
  4. Why anyone enjoys Christmas at all.  It seems like a big ol’ mess to me.  
  5. Why a woman, with H1N1, a throbbing ovarian cyst and a mortal shaving injury can still do six loads of laundry, find tights that match her daughter’s outfit, mentally located her teen aged son anywhere in the cosmos at any given second, run five miles, uphill, and still keep her home smelling like lemons while a man can sneeze and take to the bed, moaning and crying for soup like he enjoyed, from a dented, discounted can, when he lived with his mother, and no one even questions it. 
  6. Why someone can’t find an earth changing use for those “silk” ficus trees from the eighties.  Everyone had one, some had two.  No one has them now.  There must be a giant “silk” ficus forest somewhere.  Could they be used in prisons?  I think this is a thought for our representatives. 
  7. Why do we continually allow everyone to think for us?  My car tells me when and how to back up, my appliances tell me what they’re thinking, 20/20 tells me how large my meal from McDonalds should be, my government tells me everything else.  My inner rebellious princess is getting pretty tired of it all.  Am I normal? Isn’t anyone else feeling like they want to be a little, I don’t know, deviant?  I may have to roll someone or something. Graffiti anyone? 
  8. Why do strangers sometimes call me “hon”.  Sounds snippy, I know, but it makes me really cranky.  The Goose gets nervous when a waitress directs a “hon” toward me.  My gentleman neighbor calls me “little princess” and I’m good with that.  “Hon”, however, makes me want to snap my gum and order chili and black coffee from a woman named Flo.  I just don’t like it. 
  9. Gravity.  I include this for my daughter, who worries about me and my Dekalb County education.  As evidenced in a conversation with her recently,  “gravity, it just don’t make sense”. 

  10. How is it a house that looked sparkly and clean in the morning can look like a crack house by 6:30 in the evening?  In a direct link to number 9, is it possible there are small gravity deposits under the floor and on the bench in the mudroom, under the counters, under every surface within 30 feet of the door that would cause people to throw down their mail, books, scarves, jackets, cups still full of red colored drinks, shoes, bras (!?!) or anything they wanted out of their cars and LEAVE them there until   they are put away.  Bowls and plates of food, NEXT TO THE SINK!  Does anyone every wonder how they get put away?  People today are too soft, brought up with fairy tales and elves. I think family members need to be sat down and told the truth about the chore fairy, shown a picture of her haggard self, low on botox and hair color, pajamas held up by one remaining strand of elastic, swollen eyes from wine and salty food consumption.  Show them the real truth, the crime scene photos, the haggard mess the chore fairy has become, and maybe, just maybe, we can save the chore fairy.  Every time a cup is placed in the dishwasher, a chore fairy loses a wrinkle.  I do believe, I do. 

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Grown up men

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Dads are funny.  Ask anyone with a dad and they’ll usually agree.  I don’t understand the alchemy that happens from teenaged boy to father but I believe there is a scientific study in there somewhere.  

When I met the Goose, he was a boy of such breathtaking badness that I actually felt a little giddy and nervous about our first date.  He had a tiny sports car I could hear from 2 miles away and drove it with the ferocity of suicide bomber.  He knew people who knew people who were criminals. He was all leather jacket and porn mustache.  Recently, I had to sit on my hands in the car so as not to smack the living daylights out of him for driving under the speed limit in the slow lane.  I’ve also had to ask him not to wear his golf saddle shoes as leisure wear.  He takes naps and asked me just yesterday not to drive to the store because it wasn’t safe in the rain.  

What happens to men when they become dads?  When the Goose reads this he will come storming into the room telling me it’s all about responsibility and the fact that they carry the weight of the financial world upon their stooped shoulders.  Blah, blah, blah.  He will probably bring up that old refrain about “one of us has to be the adult…”

I think his 21 year old self would hang his heads in shame. 

My own father was a man tamed as well.  When he was a boy, he and his brothers would take quarter sticks of dynamite, not the lame m80s of today,  and throw them back and forth over their house and try not to be holding it when it went off.  My dad was missing the tip of his middle finger and his brother was missing the last two of his right hand.  My dad was mostly deaf and I’m sure this contributed to the problem.  

Because of his hearing problems, my dad yelled.  Many a time the True Southern Lady would have to shuush him because he blurted out inappropriate stuff in public.  When he would come to Shep’s baseball games, we would have to remind him not to shout out “get that fat kid off second base, he can’t catch anything with those chubby hands!”, AGAIN because said child’s mother hadn’t been happy about it the last time. He commented loudly on the weight of waitresses, on the dullness of the sermon during church and repeatedly shouted  “WHAT?” during movies. The True Southern Lady lived on pins and needles at what he might yell.  Now, you know he wasn’t like that when she dated him. He was the daring boy from next door. 

I know boys that used to fight and race cars and dance on the speakers at the Limelight whose main focus now is keeping the thermostat on an energy saving temperature. 

I guess it’s true and someone in the relationship has to take the role of adult.  I’m happy it was the Goose and that he’s allowed me to stay the delightful youthful girl that I’ve always been.  

Becoming a dad is a crazy kind of alchemy.  Now that our kids are mostly grown, I see signs of the old Goose emerging and I feel that it’s possible that during his regression he and Shep will pass somewhere along the way.  While I certainly appreciate his responsible attitude that’s taken great care of us all over the years, I’m looking forward to the 21 year old Goose coming back for a visit. Perhaps without the 80s porn mustache, though.  Now, I’ll just have to get the advil ready, and some Ben Gay, oh, and maybe we should lower the stereo because high decibel levels are damaging…

Goose, you’re the best Goose ever.  Don’t come find me and lecture me!

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Honey, I figured out what I’m doing off the TEE!

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I know I’ve discussed men.  Most of us have one or have had one and some of us have had multiples.  There are several repetitive discussions that go on in most homes that have a man living within it’s confines.  The problem, as I see it, is that we women have failed to band together to formulate acceptable textbook dialogue for our part of these discussions.  I imagine that the amount of superfluous conversation that could be rerouted and redirected towards a happier and more productive man could increase as much as 65%.  It is our failure, ladies, not to take this situation in hand.

Here is a sample conversation as it stands in my home at least four days a week:

 

Goose: Honey, I’ve FINALLY figured out what I’m doing off the tee.

Me: Uh huh

Goose: See my wrist?  It was turned .007% too much towards my elbow.

Me: Uh huh

Goose: It’s all in the wrist. Look! (Displays same wrist position I’ve seen 6,798,444 times).

Me: You’re blocking the tv.

Goose: See how straight that is now?  (Shoots imaginary ball across the bedroom)

Me: Uh huh

 

Now, as I see it, men are only interested in telling us things we’re not interested in hearing. Do they ever talk to us about upholstery fabric?  Shoes?  Our deep thoughts and feelings?  He’s only blabbering on about this because he’s not getting a reaction.  The other day, I feigned interest and the conversation went like this:

 

Goose: Honey, I’m going to go to the club and use my new swing.  I’ll probably shoot a 30 or something.

Me: I’d like to go along! I have a new golf skirt! We can hit the range for a while and then walk (for the exercise) 18 holes.

Goose:  Uh, yeah, that sounds…

Me: And then I might like to look at some new clubs myself…

Goose:  Well, actually, someone already asked me to play…

 

And this “off the tee” conversation has not been repeated in two weeks.  This is because men are really talking to themselves and don’t want us in their stuff.  In the same way that I ask him to run with me, I’m really thinking heaven forbid I have to drag his lazy fanny around with me. The one time he went with me this summer the moaning and complaining was biblical in nature. Still, I ask to be nice.

 

Men, no matter how great they are (and the Goose is a truly great husband), are simple in the way a good dog is simple.  They want to be acknowledged, they don’t want us to know what they’re up to all the time and the just want a pat on the head when they do a good trick.  And then there is Jeff Foxworthy’s take on what men want that is the Goose’s standard answer when I ask him what he’s thinking, “I just want a beer and to see something naked”.

 

I love it that men don’t come with all the drama that goes along with women, but if  a man gets sick, we all know how that goes.  Recently, I’ve had the first cold in years.  It has been pretty miserable and has caused me to snore.  Snoring is something I’ve heard for years.  Now that the tables have turned, the Goose is walking around, pale and wan, from loosing a few moment’s sleep.  I could literally be giving birth and the man would ask the doctor about his own suspicious symptoms .  Once, I had to see an infectious disease doctor and when the doctor was through examining me, the Goose actually said the sentence “now, back to me…” while I reclined on the table, close to death.  This has become a code sentence in our family and I think it sums up men in general.  Maybe people in general.  We care about our loved ones.  We really do, we just want to talk about our own stuff and figure out what we’re doing off the tee. 

Hey Y’all!

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A word on men.  Southern men.  I have really known nothing in my life BUT southern men so it’s possible this observation might extend beyond the Mason Dixon line, or as my dad used to say, the edge of civilized living.  I do realize, when recounting these stories that are everyday life to me that my friends who didn’t grow up here sometimes react with more enthusiasm than necessary.  Take for instance my friend the Trophy Wife.  Although she is a transplant, she has taken to southern bellism with gusto.  She can banter back with a “bless your heart” or a “y’all come down for dinner” with the best of them.  Her friend, we’ll call him the “Sales Manager” was recently over for dinner.  Now the Trophy Wife’s dog has a terrible time staying in their fence.  He has had every electric collar known to mankind and now has one touted by the salesman as “strong enough to put down an elephant”.  The Sales Manager had had a few cocktails the other night and started that good ol’ boy “aw, how strong could it be” stuff.  Though he was begged, pleaded with even, not to try it and was at least dissuaded from putting it around his neck, the Sales Manager strapped the electric collar to his thigh.  Upon walking into range, his right leg shot up at an angle perpendicular to his body and his face began to take on the look of a wax candle.  His lip sneered in a grotesque Elvis impersonation. Thrown to the ground, the SM couldn’t stop the bucking and wiggling long enough to get to his feet and get out of range of the fence.  He tried worming, snaking and eventually rolling his way out of range, causing such injury to his wrist that he needed an emergency room.  All this was done surrounded by friends laughing too hard to render aid.  Hey y’all, watch this!

My son and our neighbor, Cheese, aren’t immune to the southern man’s need for danger either.  Several years ago they fashioned wings from bamboo and a tarp.  Now, these are educated kids.  They were in advanced science classes.  Cheese’s dad is from a northern state and all these facts combined should have meant someone could have foreseen the problem. They really should have known better.  After I weakly suggested that it was NOT a good idea to jump from the roof, I poured a glass of wine and went out to sit in a chair and watch.  I mean, I’m not one to miss a good show.  What saddens me is not only the loss of good bamboo tomato stakes but the fact that, after seeing Cheese plummet to the ground at a high rate of speed, they climbed up and tried it a few more times.  Also, I had to learn the emergency room is surprisingly strict on rules about bringing in wine, even white wine.

One of the best “hey y’all” stories I’ve ever heard is from my brother-in-law, Kippy.  He was at the county fair with some friends.  One of them was wearing a Marine red satin boxing cape.  I still have not gotten to the bottom of this and, hearing him tell it, it’s not important.  As I adore dressing up in old prom dresses, I’m not the one to cast stones.  This friend was not a Marine nor a boxer, though.  They come upon a bear in a cage.  Now, I’ll have to stop right here and say that this makes me so angry and sad and causes me to wag my head back and forth in such a way that I look like Weezy from the Jeffersons.  A bear, in a cage, at a fair is wrong on any level.  Still, the story is funny and I am hoping the bear has mauled it’s keeper and run away to join wild bears picnicking in a woodland paradise. Anyway, the friend starts bragging that he can whoop the bear.  I believe his actual words might have been “I’m gonna whoop that bear’s ass”. He becomes so unruly that the keeper says, well, come on, son.  What happened in the next 22 seconds or so is that the bear grabbed him in a giant bear hug and breathed such rancid breath on him that the friend fainted dead away in his cape. This so entertained his inebriated friends and makes a good story, that they will tell it at any opportunity.

I love southern men.  I love the way they say ma’am, I love the way they open doors, stop to change people’s flat tires and appreciate a woman in a flowery dress.  A good southern man will never turn down a chance for bourbon, cold beer or anything that gets them dirty, and causes loud bafoonery.  Now that’s just good fun.