humour

Suitably Embarrassed

/ Diane Henders / 47 Comments

A while ago Carrie Rubin posted “My Closet Has Skeletons – Literally”, in which she offered blog awards to those brave enough to post photos of their own closet-cleanout detritus.

I can’t resist the opportunity to accumulate blogging awards and public humiliation simultaneously, so here goes…

I hate waste and clutter.  I can’t count the number of times I’ve cleaned out my closet over the years, ruthlessly culling clothes and shipping them off to charity.  If it doesn’t fit right, isn’t in style, or I haven’t worn it recently, out it goes, no matter how much I paid for it or how much I loved it at the time.

But every now and then I get caught in an embarrassing bout of hoarding.

I got this suit sometime in the late 80s or early 90s; I can’t remember.  The pants still fit, which leads me to believe that it looked just as ridiculous when I wore it regularly as it does now.  The photo fails to capture the enormous bagginess of the rear.  (The pants’ rear, not mine.  I have no ass to speak of.)

But it’s linen (the suit, I mean).  It feels wonderful and I love the colour (it’s nicer than the photo).  And, hello, it still fits twenty-odd years later.

Please excuse my geeky expressions – as I’ve noted before, I’m NOT photogenic. And I have never worn the suit in public with white socks, either. Promise.

Please excuse my geeky expressions – as I’ve noted before, I’m NOT photogenic. And I have never worn the suit in public with white socks, either. Promise.

Somehow the suit has survived all those culls even though I know:

a) it doesn’t look good on me now;

b) it probably never looked good on me;

c) it’s not fashionable;

d) it probably wasn’t fashionable when I wore it;

e) the probability of it ever becoming fashionable is roughly on par with the probability of Oprah hiring me as her fashion consultant; and

f) even if it did become fashionable again, I probably wouldn’t wear it because, let’s face it, it doesn’t look good on me.

So I tried it on, snickered, got Hubby to snap those incriminating photos… and then tenderly tucked it back into my closet.

I’m embarrassed.

Hubby is my exact opposite.

He putters happily around his man-cave surrounded by his “stuff”. He’s completely unfazed by the knowledge that he’ll likely never need, use, or even look at 90% of the stuff he’s hoarding.  He might need it someday, and that’s good enough for him.

And I acknowledge the wisdom of his approach every time I throw something away and then discover I need it two days after the garbage truck has come and gone.

But I can’t overcome my need to organize and throw away.  Except for my linen suit.

I prefer to call this “loyalty”, not “irrational hoarding”.

Are you a thrower-outer or a pack rat?  And please tell me I’m not the only one clinging to an unsuitable, unflattering, useless item…

P.S. I’m still in Manitoba this week, and I thought I’d offer you folks in southern climes a small opportunity to gloat.  Welcome to mid-April in southern Canada:

Yes, this is unusual even for us.

And it’s snowing again today. Yes, this is unusual even for us.

Kiss-Ass Typo!

/ Diane Henders / 49 Comments

I don’t know whether it’s my eyes, my twisted mind, or simply the fact that I’m usually pushed for time and skimming text, but as I mentioned here and here, I misread phrases all too frequently.

Here are my latest malapropisms:

I was looking for a chuckle the day I clicked a link to YouTube, but I started laughing before the video even started to run.  Why?  Because I misread its title as ‘SNL Digital Snort’.   It was, in fact, ‘Digital Short’.  But I think they should go with ‘Snort’ – it’s much more appropriate for funny videos.

Spam is always fertile ground for misreads, probably because it’s so poorly written that I lose the context.  For example, a few months ago, I read ‘I got a wedgie’ in one of my spam comments.

“Well,” thought I, “Thanks for sharing, but that’s a little too much information.”  On second glance, though, it actually said ‘I got a webpage’.  Good to know.

Far more disturbing was ‘…they will be penetrated from this website’.  Yikes!  Remind me to steer clear of that one.

But no, wrong again.  It was ‘…they will be benefited from this web site’, which was less alarming, though slightly grammatically mangled.

And then there are headlines.

I was cheerfully skimming the tech news one day when I discovered the following damning headline:  ‘Cisco leaves the consumer networking market after selling monkeys’.

Well, those bastards.  I should think they’d slink away from the public eye after stooping to such a low.  Where the hell was PETA when this was happening?

You guessed it.  It was another Diane Special.  The headline actually read ‘…after selling Linksys’.

Oops.  My bad.

I knew I must have read this link wrong:  ‘Big secrets of how to sell women’ .  I didn’t even bother to get wound up about that one.  Sure enough, it was ‘How to sell TO women’.  Whew.

I ran across the next one on somebody’s blog (I think), but I can’t remember whose.  Up front, I’ll offer my abject apologies to whoever posted this.  They’ll probably need to slap me if they ever read my perversion of their words.

But I couldn’t help it.  It was a slightly blurry photo of printed lyrics.  The title was Hero and I read that with no difficulty, but I’m pretty sure the body of it said ‘Herpes’.  Twice.  Even after peering at it, I had to really concentrate before I could see ‘Heroes’.

The latest in my list would have made me laugh if I hadn’t been so certain it was just another case of my mixed-up reading.  On a music website, I read ‘kiss ass guitar’.

By that time, I’d become used to my own screw-ups, so I didn’t even permit myself a snicker.  I mean, obviously it was ‘kick ass guitar’, right?

Wrong.

I looked at it again.  Then again.

It really did say ‘kiss ass guitar’.  Talk about an embarrassing typo.

I guess I should have sent them an email and gently pointed out the mistake, but it didn’t occur to me until well after I’d clicked away chuckling, and by then I couldn’t remember where I’d read it.

But maybe it’s better that way.  Might as well share the joy – that website made my day!

Seen any good typos lately?

Covering My Ass

/ Diane Henders / 29 Comments

I expend a great deal of effort just trying to cover my ass.

I mentioned my disastrous bathing suit debacle in an earlier post, and at the time I noted that I’m very careful about my rear view these days.

Not careful enough, apparently.

The other day I bent over to retrieve something from the bottom of the fridge, and Hubby said, “Oh, nice look.”

With a feeling of impending doom, I said, “Thanks.  Um… what exactly do you mean…?”

Sure enough, the yoga pants that are my daily office uniform had succumbed to the pressure.  It wasn’t noticeable as long as I stood upright, but as soon as I bent over, there was my ass for all the world to see through the dreaded transparent spandex mesh.  (No, the pants weren’t Lululemon – check out notquiteold’s funny Yoga Porn post for more on that.)

I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.  Ever since I was a kid, the butt-end of my pants was always the first to go.  All the other kids wore through the knees, but my jeans were perfect in every way… except for the patches on the rear.

I once wore out the backside of a new-ish pair of jeans in one day, but that was a special case – I was shingling a roof and I didn’t have knee pads.  When my knees gave out I finished the job shuffling along on my butt, which was a bad idea in many respects.  Quite apart from damage to clothing, if you’ve ever installed asphalt shingles, you know about those nasty little spiky bits that stick into your flesh like needles.  Try extracting those from areas you can’t really see without a mirror and some uncomfortable contortions.

But getting back to the point…

A couple of years ago I tore a muscle kickboxing.  A muscle in an uncomfortable and embarrassing place:   right at the top of my hamstring.

Which is polite way to say “my ass”.

I didn’t go for physiotherapy.  I just couldn’t bring myself to beg my (young male) physiotherapist to rub my butt.  Worse still, to pay my young male physiotherapist to rub my butt.  It just smacked of desperate cougar-dom.

Anyway, the muscle gradually healed on its own, but it still gives me trouble occasionally.  In the past few months it’s been sore.  I’ve been ignoring it because, hell, if I woke up one morning and nothing hurt, I’d check the obituaries to make sure I hadn’t died in the night.

But eventually it occurred to me that perhaps there was an underlying cause.

Sure enough, when I had a close look at the desk chair I’d been sitting in for the past three years, there was absolutely no padding left in the seat.  It was just a bum-shaped fabric-covered bowl with solid (and extremely hard) wood underneath.

Which probably explains the destruction of my yoga pants, mercilessly grinding between the unyielding bones of my ass and the unyielding seat of my chair.

Now I have a new chair and new yoga pants, but I know I’m solving the wrong problem here.

Anybody know where I can get a new butt?

* * *

P.S. Thanks to everybody for your concern over my eye. (For those who didn’t hear, I got hit kickboxing on Sunday and spent most of Monday waiting to find out if I might end up with a detached retina. I wasn’t even fighting; it was just a stupid accident during an easy sparring session.)  Everything seems fine so far – my eye is still a little achy and scratchy, but my vision is back to normal and the doc has cleared me for easy workouts.  But no kickboxing for a while.  *sigh*

I Don’t Get No Respect

/ Diane Henders / 45 Comments

As I mentioned a few weeks ago, I’ve been feeling under-respected lately.  And the more I think about it, the more I realize it’s not just a recent thing.

In school, I was known as the smart kid in the class.  Anybody who’s ever been a kid knows that “smart” is not a highly-regarded quality in the schoolyard.  Fortunately I was also a jock so I didn’t suffer too badly, but it was a relief to go on to university where “smart” would get some respect.

Little did I know.

I actually wanted to go into engineering, but my parents convinced me that a) I shouldn’t neglect my artistic side; b) my brother was already in engineering and I shouldn’t compete; and c) interior design would be a better career for me because when I got married and had a family, I could make the house look nice for my husband.

As wince-worthy as that advice is now, it was well-meant at the time and like the dutiful daughter I was, I followed it.

Interior design was not a good fit.  *cue uproarious laughter at the understatement of the century*

I was really good at the technical side.  I totally sucked at the design part.

Whenever somebody asked me what I did for a living, I cringed.  When I told them, their instant reaction was to pat me on the head and tell me how nice and girly it was for me to make houses pretty.

I spent far too much time explaining that no; interior decorators only pick pretty colours.  Interior designers take a brutal four-year university bachelor’s degree, draft plans and construction details for walls, casework, and millwork, know the ins and outs of building codes and fire codes, supervise construction sites, and administer complex project tenders and contracts.  And they pick pretty colours.

Unless they’re me.  Then they get one of the other designers to pick pretty colours for them.

After twelve excruciating years, I switched to IT, which suited me much better.  You’d think that would garner some respect, but it turns out that announcing you’re a computer geek stops conversations dead.  People’s eyes dart sideways, they mumble, “I don’t know anything about computers”, and then they flee.

You’d think I was trying to engage them in a rousing discussion about PPPoE protocol or something.

Okay, fine.  So now I’m an author.

When I tell people that, they recoil as if I’d just stuck my hand down my pants and started smiling and humming.  Usually they mutter something to the effect of “Oh, God, another author” and flee.

Or they pat me on the head and tell me how nice and girly it is for me to write pretty little romances.

Uh.

Have you seen my books?

So I give up.  From now on when people ask me what I do, I’m going to tell them I’m a cannibalistic serial killer.  And that they’re looking particularly tasty today.

They’ll still flee, but at least I’ll get a laugh out of it.

Anybody else getting respect for their career?  Please… tell me what it’s like…

* * *

Many thanks to Shree over at Heartsongs for nominating me for the Liebster and One Lovely Blog awards!  To (kinda) fulfill the requirements of the awards, here’s a link to a couple of posts with obscure facts about me, and please pop over to visit my favourite bloggers – they’re in the blogroll at the right.  Thanks!

Stand Back: Brain Farts!

/ Diane Henders / 40 Comments

My brain has apparently been eating ‘way too many beans lately.  The brain farts are getting embarrassing.

The past few weeks I’ve been totally immersed in finishing Book 6 in the Never Say Spy series.  Who knew fiction writing could cause such nasty brain flatulence?  Must be all the fibre in the pages.

The other night I slid into bed and Hubby said, “Oh, are you finished in the bathroom already?”

I stared at him blankly for a moment.  No, I wasn’t wondering ‘Who are you and what are you doing in my bed?’  I wake up in the middle of the night to do that.  Seriously.  It’s the weirdest feeling.

But getting on with the story…

I realized I’d completely forgotten to wash my face and brush my teeth.  So I got out of bed, went to the bathroom… and put on deodorant.

Shortly thereafter, I had a session with my muay thai trainer.  I’ve been going to the gym regularly for quite a few years, and when I realize it’s time to go I often leap up from my computer without fully disengaging my brain.  (Yes, actually, that is quite painful.  Thanks for asking.)  So before I leave home,  I perform a short ritual similar to the Catholic “Spectacles-Testicles-Wallet-And-Watch” to confirm that I have my shorts, running shoes, gym card, and hair elastic.

Knowing I’d be distracted that day, I took extra care , double-checking to make sure I had everything before I left.  So I arrived, full of pride, with the four things on my checklist.  But… without my hand wraps, boxing gloves, water bottle, or shin guards.  Smooth.  Very smooth.

Several days later, I booked an appointment with my accountant.  I had just completed a marathon 14-hour writing session the previous day and I was coming into the home stretch with the final chapters.  I knew I was going to be distracted.

I repeated the appointment time to myself and to Hubby several times, beginning two days prior to the appointment.  I put the appointment in my computer calendar with a popup reminder and an audible alarm.  The night before, I reminded myself again:  “Appointment at 11:00 AM tomorrow.”  The morning of the appointment, I got out of bed and reminded myself, “I have to get up from the computer at 10:00 AM to get ready for my meeting.”

When I looked at the clock next, it was 11:15.  Much grovelling ensued.

You’d think I’d have learned my lesson.  But no.

Only a few hours later, I was heading out to the gym.  Not because I’d remembered it; simply because it’s muscle memory after all these years.  I can’t count the number of times I’ve arrived at the gym and begun my workout only to wake up and go, “Shit, I didn’t feel like doing this today.  I was going to skip it…”

Anyway, I was getting changed before I left home and I forgot to put on my bra.  Fortunately the bathroom is upstairs, and by the time I got downstairs it had become uncomfortably obvious that I wasn’t being supported in the manner to which I am accustomed.

My final draft should be finished and out to my editors/beta readers this week, after which I’ll be able to return to a state that passes for normalcy (at least for me).  I shudder to think what other gaffes I may commit in the interim.

I think it’s time to get a T-shirt: “ Beware:  Brain Farts.  Keep back 15m.”

Anybody else suffer from brain flatulence?  And please tell me I’m not the only one who wakes up wondering “Who are you and what are you doing in my bed?”

* * *

I’m doing another Goodreads giveaway this week:  Two signed copies of Never Say Spy are up for grabs.  Follow this link to enter the contest!

I Love A Guy With A Big Deck

/ Diane Henders / 40 Comments

As you may know, I’m a toolaholic.  Most men are eager to show me their tools, and in fact, they frequently invite me to play with their tools whenever I want.

I’m old-fashioned, though.  As much as I love tools of all shapes and sizes, I really prefer not to handle any but my Hubby’s.  After all, when I’ve got a top-quality tool at home, why would I go out looking for anything else?  You just don’t know where other men’s tools have been.

The other day the conversation turned (again) to tools, and Hubby showed me his deck.  You’d think after nearly fourteen years of marriage it would be old news to me, but what a surprise!

He had gotten one of those deck enlargement kits.

I know, I know.  I used to be a sceptic, too, but now I’ve seen the proof.  This kit really worked.  He used to have a much smaller deck.  It was nice and rigid and it worked well, but everybody knows size does matter.  So he paid the money and got the kit… and now his deck is huge!

When he showed it to me for the first time, I couldn’t keep my hands off it.  After I’d fondled it for a while, he asked if I had any ideas about mounting it.

Boy, did I.

But we were worried we might not be able to use his new deck safely because it’s so big.

We were right.  We had some difficulties with the fit.  And stability was an issue.  Even though it was big and stiff, it tended to shift sideways without warning, particularly if any significant force was applied.  And it was positively dangerous under vigorous use.  Slow and smooth was the only workable option.

We agreed that even though the big deck was impressive, it really wasn’t working as well as his original small deck.  But we both liked the idea of the bigger deck.

So we got creative.  A minor surgical procedure reshaped it to make the tool fit snugly but comfortably in the aperture.  Then we added some extra supports so the deck wouldn’t collapse even if I got careless about how and where I placed my piece.  And he could push as hard and fast as he wanted.

It took a bit of extra effort to get everything working the way we wanted it, but in the end we were glowing with satisfaction.  Now Hubby’s got the biggest deck of any guy I know.  I can use it as often as I want, and it never fails to stand up to even the most enthusiastic use.

I’m so excited, I just have to share the before and after pictures of Hubby’s deck:

Original tiny deck

Original tiny deck

New huge deck

New huge deck

Yeah, it’s a bandsaw deck.  Jeez, what did you think I was talking about?

If, like me, you can’t get enough big decks, here’s one of my favourite comedy routines:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQ7Ue5emo6I

Anybody else like big decks?

Sometimes I Wonder…

/ Diane Henders / 34 Comments

According to Science Illustrated, “Letting the mind wonder fosters creativity”.  Maybe, but letting my mind wonder fosters thoughts that range from daft to disturbing.  For example:

Sometimes when I’m talking to somebody, I wonder if behind that expression of polite interest, they’re psychically screaming “Shut up!  Shut UP!”

I’ve done that lots of times, for various reasons.  Sometimes it’s because I’m on a deadline and the other person simply won’t acknowledge that their detailed description of the pickle they ate at lunch may in fact be less important than the document the client needs in ten minutes.

Sometimes it’s because the person flapping their gums is expressing ideas so colossally stupid, I can’t believe they haven’t already choked on their own idiocy.

Sometimes it’s because the speaker is brilliant but my poor brain is full to the brim, and trying to pour more information into it is a complete waste of everyone’s time.

And sometimes it’s a “too much information” conversation where psychic screaming is my last, desperate attempt to prevent the images from penetrating my brain and leaving it perforated and deformed by a nasty case of BSE (Bozo Spongiform Encephalopathy).

So if I’ve been the psychic screamer that frequently, it stands to reason that sometimes I’m the cause of psychic screams.  The scream-ee.

It’s a humbling thought, and not a little disturbing.  But it does tend to make me strive for brevity in my conversations.

* * *

Here’s another thing I wonder about:  Can anybody tell me why the white hairs always pop up as stiff as wires, while the red hairs lie flat and behave themselves?  That white hair used to be red.  It’s coming from the same place on my head.  You’d think if the colour went out of it, it should be thinner and wimpier.

But no.  As soon as the colour is gone, the hair follicle kicks into high gear like some freakishly pumped-up mutant superhero with ‘roid rage:  “Aha, the kryptonite is gone!  My super-powers are restored!  Bam!  Pow!  Zap!”

I don’t know why it happens, but it does explain Albert Einstein’s ‘do.  In a few more years, I’ll look just like him.

* * *

The other day I was out walking in the park behind our house when I came upon a used condom frozen into the snow, right in the middle of the path.  It had snowed only a couple of days before, so I knew it was fresh (if such a term can be correctly applied, given the object in question).  It had also been -25 degrees Celsius for the past week.

Which made me wonder:  What quirk of intellect allows a person to have sufficient maturity, restraint, and judgement to practice safe sex under even the most rigorous (and I apply that word within the full range of its meanings) conditions… and still remain dumb enough to a) whip it out in the middle of a public park; and b) risk ending up with a cocksicle at -25?

Is there some sort of Polar Bear Sex Club or something?  You know, like those hardy folks who jump into ice water for no apparent reason?

And could somebody please look that up and let me know?  ‘Cause there’s no way I’m gonna google “Polar Bear Sex Club”.

What do you wonder about?

End Of The World

/ Diane Henders / 35 Comments

Well, dang.  I’m still here.  Guess I’ll have to pay those Christmas bills after all.

It’s the official day of the end of the world and so far there’s no big bang or big flush or big pffftttt or whatever.  I’m a little unclear about whether the world was supposed to end last night at the stroke of midnight or tonight at the stroke of midnight, though, so maybe there’s still time.

And anyway, the Mayans weren’t specific about what time zone they were using.  Maybe the end of the world will creep around the globe following the time zones.  Just in case, I’m going to keep an eye on my blogging buddy AquaTom over in the UK.  He’s having an End of the World blog party today, so if he goes dark, I’ll know what’s coming.

You, too, can receive this special advance warning… or just pop over and to say hi.  Tom asked his readers to spread the word, so please consider this your invitation to the End of the World Party:

Come join the End Of The World party over at AquaTom Mansion

Come join the End Of The World party over at AquaTom Mansion

Tom suggested a few writing challenges to bring to the party, namely “The fun side to a bad hair day”, “Dashing through the snow”, and/or “The passing of time”, so here goes:

Bad Hair Day…

For me, a “bad hair day” is virtually indistinguishable from a “good hair day”.  I wash it and let it dry, and it always looks more or less the same.  I’m not sure whether that’s “good” or “bad”, but I’m trying to imagine what a truly “bad hair day” would be like.

I think Medusa must’ve had some seriously bad hair days.  I’ve never tried to wash a snake, but I suspect they wouldn’t be cooperative.  They probably wouldn’t take kindly to curlers, either.  And imagine the disasters on date night.  Even if she could find a guy who was smart enough not to look her in the face and turn to stone, even a simple kiss would be an exercise in frustration:  “No, no!  Bad, bad hair!  Stop biting the nice man!  Wait, come back, honey; they didn’t mean it!”

No wonder she was cranky.

* * *

Dashing Through The Snow…

When I was a teenager, I strapped on my cross-country skis one cold, clear night and dashed out across the pristine whiteness surrounding our farm.  Skiing was easy across the smooth, flat fields.  The moon was full and so brilliant that my shadow undulated along beside me.  The squeak of snow under my skis was the only sound.  It was breathtaking.

It was also stupid.

It was minus 30 degrees Celsius, and even though I’d put on my warm down jacket, I was only wearing blue jeans on my legs.  You may have heard the expression “freezing one’s ass”.  I did.  Along with my thighs.

To this day, if the temperature dips below minus 10, I have to wear ski pants because of the damaged circulation in those areas.  Not quite the delightful experience most people envision when singing “dashing through the snow”.  But…

With The Passing Of Time…

I’ve forgiven my teenage stupidity, and I still enjoy the lovely memory of that bright, silent night.  And hey, at the end of the world, that’s what counts, right?

Happy Apocalypse!

It’s Complicated…

/ Diane Henders / 33 Comments

Last week, I couldn’t decide what to eat for lunch until I looked at the weather forecast.  It wasn’t even as simple as needing to know what the current weather conditions were.  No, I needed a forecast.

On the weekend, we had discussed going to a swanky restaurant near our place on Tuesday night.  But on Monday, the weatherman forecasted a nice, warm, sunny Tuesday.  Prime opportunity to put up the Christmas lights when Hubby got home from work.

No, not so he could put up the Christmas lights; so he could hold the ladder while I put up the lights.  I’m taller than he is, and he’s afraid of heights.  I’m okay with heights, but I’m afraid of ladders unless he’s holding them.  We’re a team.

So I decided to cook a pot of stew Tuesday night so we wouldn’t have to run around trying to get the lights up before rushing off to our dinner reservation.  We agreed to go out Wednesday night instead.

But Tuesday’s forecast was wrong.  The temperature dropped steadily, a bone-cutting wind blew in from the east, and snow sifted down.  We lost interest in putting up the lights, but we ate at home and stuck with our plans for Wednesday.

Until evening, when we discovered it was supposed to dump snow overnight.  So we decided to wait and see what Wednesday morning was like before making the final decision on dinner.  Neither of us has any particular fear of driving in the snow; after all, we’re Canadian.  We’d have to confine our outings to ten minutes in August if we were afraid of driving in the snow.

But it’s annoying to fight the idiot drivers, so we tend not to actively seek out snow-driving.

Fast-forward (or, in the case of this blog post, “drag agonizingly toward an obscure but hopefully imminent conclusion”) to Wednesday noon.

I went downstairs for lunch, opened the fridge door, and realized that the only thing worth eating was the leftover stew.  Fine… except that there was enough stew for two.

So if we weren’t going out, it would make more sense for me to make something else and save the leftover stew for supper.  But if we were going out, I could eat the stew for lunch, go out for dinner1, and then eat stew again for Thursday’s lunch.

Only one catch:  It was snowing lightly.  If it was going to dump snow, we’d probably want to stay home.  If it was going to hold off until after supper, we’d probably go.  Time to check the weather forecast.

Heavy snowfall warning.

Guess I’ll make something for lunch…

Phone rings.

Hubby says, “Let’s go out tonight.  It’s going to snow, so the restaurant won’t be too busy.”

*facepalm*

———————-

1Note:  I grew up in the country.  ‘Breakfast’ was in the morning, ‘dinner’ was at noon, ‘lunch’ was at four o’clock, and ‘supper’ was at six.  Then I got out into the big world and discovered that urbanites referred to the noon meal as ‘lunch’, the six o’clock meal as ‘dinner’, and there was no four o’clock meal!  City dwellers are sick bastards.  So now I usually call ‘dinner’ ‘lunch’, and ‘supper’ ‘supper’, unless I’m going out for ‘dinner’…

Have I confused you yet?  What do you call your meals?  (And why are you trying to slap me?)

Bro Bulletin – Questions Of Doom: #2

/ Diane Henders / 14 Comments

For the month of Movember, I’m supporting my Mo’ Bros by offering a few helpful insights into the female mind.  This is the second instalment of the Questions of Doom series. 

* * *

(Note:  Ladies, this strategy can work for you, too.  Change the pronouns, substitute “tool” for “jewellery”, and you’re away to the races.)

QOD #2:  Did you just buy yourself a new fill-in-the-blank (FITB)?  *Scowls, hands on hips*

Oh, bro.  Buddy.  You screwed up big.  You got busted holding a new FITB and she’s mad, for one of two reasons:

  1. Money’s tight and now you won’t be able to afford groceries/coats for the kids/a family trip; or
  2. You bought something nice for yourself and nothing for her.

If it’s #1, well, don’t be a shithead.  Return the FITB and go buy coats for your kids.

But it’s probably #2.  So here we go:

Bad Answer:  “Yes” – Depending on her temperament, you’ll get:

  1. No nookie for the foreseeable future; AND
  2. Icy silence; or
  3. Increasingly hostile questions like “How much did it cost?” and “Why do you need a new FITB when you’ve already got a perfectly good one?” etc., followed by icy silence; or
  4. Increasingly hostile questions followed by berserk yelling and/or tears and/or flying objects, followed by icy silence.

Worse Answer:  “No” – I don’t mean to be critical, but “no” is a really dumb choice.  You’re standing there with a brand new FITB in your hand.  The tags are still hanging off it.  You know you’re lying.  Worse still, she knows you’re lying, and now you’re insulting her intelligence, too.  See consequences of “yes” above.  Times ten.

So how do you save yourself?  Okay, guys, I want to make it clear that I don’t support lying to your significant other.  In the first place, it’s slimy, and in the second place, it’ll come back to bite you in the ass sooner or later.

But in the spirit of Movember, I’m going to cut you some slack, ‘cause what I’m about to suggest isn’t the blackest of lies.  It’s more like a retroactive truth, if you do it right.

The following solution can make you look like a hero, but it’s complex, dangerous, expensive, and requires some acting skill.  It’s probably easier to just return the FITB, or else let her chew your nuts off and get it over with.

You still want to know?  Okay…

Best Answer:

Step 1:  “Oh, I was hoping you wouldn’t see this until (tonight/tomorrow/whenever the stores are open next).” 

You already look guilty as hell, but try to add a bit of disappointment to your expression.  She knows the first part of that statement is absolutely true, but she’s slightly confused by the second part.  This moment of uncertainty buys you time for:

Step 2:  “I know (occasion) is coming up, so I picked out the perfect gift for you, but I didn’t want to buy it until I knew it was exactly what you wanted.  And I bought this FITB for myself because you’re always saying I’m hard to buy for.”

This is the dangerous part.  She’s pretty damn sure you’re lying, but the lure of “the perfect gift” is slowing her reflexes.  This also assumes you’re within a month or so of some mutual gift-giving occasion.

Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and an anniversary are possibilities for the “occasion”, but if you’re desperate and imaginative, you could whip out something plausible but unverifiable.  Try an obscurity like “the seventh anniversary of the first day I realized I was in love with you”.

Just remember, if you mention it once, it’s forever graven in her memory.  Now you’re on the hook for another gift-giving occasion every year.  How much do you really want that FITB, anyway?

That much?  Seriously?  Okay, then…

Step 3:  Rush her to the jewellery store* and point randomly at something.

Any jewellery will do.  Feign as much enthusiasm as possible, but do not utter the words ‘It’s you’.  It’s not.  No matter what you choose, she’ll want something different.  This is just a decoy.

Step 4:  “I picked this one, but I want it to be perfect, so if you’d rather have something else…”

Suck it up, buddy, ‘cause this is where it gets expensive.  Grit your teeth, smile, and buy whatever she chooses.  I warned you it’d probably be easier to just take your punishment.

Step 5:  Buy her another gift when the actual gift-giving occasion rolls around.

This is a crucial step.  It covers your ass in case she knew you were full of shit earlier but she was willing to play along because she got a nice piece of jewellery out of it.

However, if she actually bought your act earlier, this makes you a hero.  When she says “I thought we exchanged FITBs earlier”, tell her, “I know, but I couldn’t resist buying you this”.

Kiss. Cuddle.  Get laid.  Nicely done, bro.

And next time, hide the damn FITB until you can honestly answer, “No, I’ve had it for months.”

*Note to Hubby:  Don’t try this on me.  Jewellery doesn’t cut it.  I want tools.  What, that shiny set in my trunk?  No, I’ve had that for months.

Movember Moment:  Okay, let’s start with the basics:  What is the prostate gland and how does it work?

P.S. Thanks to Le Clown for starting Bloggers for Movember, and thanks to everyone who weighed in with support for me on the weekend.  I’m feeling much better now about donating half the November royalties from my paperback and e-book sales from all channels to the Cancer Society.