Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Spite Mammals

I woke up this morning to this chaos on the sidewalk to the front porch. Lirope leaves and mulch were strewn across the sidewalk and pulled into a right-hand corner where nothing grows.

At first I blamed the deer. “Damn deer,” I said, “Last season they ate all the Ajuga and licked the shrubs to death. Now they’re after the Lirope.”

Then I wondered why some of the Lirope debris was on the right side of the sidewalk. I remembered that I had blocked off the rabbit warren there.

Here's how it looked last week when I blocked it off.

All sealed up, no Lirope leaves.

Here’s how it looked this morning:

So, evidently the chunky rabbit did not like having his front door blocked, and decided to knock the block down and repay vandalism with vandalism.

Overnight, he grumbled, “These humans have infested my home. Pests. A nuisance.” He then checked Rabbit Wikipedia for “how to rid your home of humans.”

“I see. I need to destroy their nest. Well let’s wipe out the landscaping they built.”

Then he chewed off half a Lirope ...

... and dragged it across the sidewalk to cover the offending rock. (Obvious homage to The Godfather and the horse head.)

I complained to Gary, who OF COURSE TOOK THE RABBIT’S SIDE. He even said, “We are living in their field, you know. They have a right to be here.”

Two against one. I had no choice but to remove the rock and stuff some extra Lirope in the hole as an acknowledgement of who is in charge. 

Blood Drive (thru)

Our doctor’s office has done a wonderful job of keeping up with Gary. Since he’s been feverish for nine weeks, they wanted to check if possibly his thyroid was off (or, I suppose, if he’s suffering side effects of the medication). 

So, for that they needed a blood draw, and while I was special enough to get the nurse to do the porch visit, Gary needed to use the drive-up lab at the hospital.

This is how it’s supposed to go:

1. Drive to the special lot at the edge of the Hospital complex.
2. Park and call the special number posted in front of every parking space.
3. An operator will answer and get your insurance info.
4. The operator tells you to drive to the parking garage and get in line.
5. Hang your arm out of the window and get your blood taken.

Five minutes after we called Gary got impatient and said, “Let’s leave,” and then he said that every ten minutes. After Gary’s “Let’s leave” at the one hour mark I snapped “Fine,” and started to drive off.

I had just backed out when the operator came on line, so while she got our info I was circling to get back to the lot. There is a camera on the lot and she must have seen us leaving. I can only imagine that’s why she skipped step 4 - the step to tell us to drive to the parking garage. She must have seen us on the lot camera and thought that was where we were heading.

So we drove back to where we had been for the last hour and sat on hold again while we fought another forty-five minutes, and then gave up and went home.

Of course, the next day Gary went on his own and everything went seamlessly — he called, they picked up in five minutes, they told him to go to the parking garage, and he did all the waiting there. 

The best part was finding that his thyroid numbers are in the right zone. I suppose the increased meds that helped with that are what’s causing the fever and misery. 

Gary Update

At long last, after these many weeks, Gary has turned the corner. He’s not totally healed, but he can go through the night without a fever, though not through a whole day.

He was even feisty enough to try to pick an argument with me, but I did not engage. It was a sign of good health.

What has he had? I don’t care. The doctor’s office checked up on him, which was nice. I don’t know what he told them. I don’t care. All I know is I’d rather have a feisty troublemaker than a big lump of feverish flesh in the bed.

 

 

Baby Time

I was surprised to look through the wildlife cam photos and find baby raccoons.
Usually the babies don’t show until the first week of June. Based on the date these were two weeks ahead of schedule. They look pretty chunky for babies, too. I think someone’s been holding out.

But it is baby season. Gary complained that he put out half a bag of peanuts and they were all gone the next day. Usually this means that Gary will put out an entire bag the next night, but he said, and I quote, “screw those piggy little babies.”

There had been some drama deep in the night when another mama had to defend a baby that had just done something indefensible.

In contrast to the chubby baby raccoons, at dusk I have been seeing the tiniest baby squirrels ever. I read that you rarely see small squirrels, because they don’t leave the nest until they have fur. I take that to mean they have to hit puberty. Well, this year we have four tiny peach-fuzz squirrels out here. Size of baby kittens, if you don’t count the tail.

Raccoon babies too big, squirrel babies too small. That should go in the Farmer’s Almanac as signs of a global pandemic.

Butt Stuff

Gary and I are pretty grabby with each other, which is strange because I’m not physical with anyone else. I’m not a big hugger. 

I didn’t realize how much time we spent nose-booping or hair-ruffling until the covid kept us away from each other. 

We have now established a new tradition to take the place of our nightly goodnight kiss: the nightly goodnight baboon butt rub. We stand on opposite sides of the hallway in the doorways of our respective rooms. Then we face away from each other, back into the hallway until our butts meet, then spend some time rubbing our butts against each other. 

Every night the butt rub takes a different tone. Some nights it’s a big rumbly rub fest, some nights it’s a perfunctory bump. Last night there was a repetitive thrusting quality that reminded me of early sex, when you both have your own rhythm going, and one person’s on the out-step when the other’s expecting the in-step.

I think I might miss the butt-bumping when life goes back to normal.

Gary’s Visit

Well, the day began with Gary stomping around, demanding that he could drive himself to urgent care center where he was supposed to get the chest X-ray to rule out Covid pneumonia. The stomping wore him out so much that he said I’d have to drive him: he was too weak. We expected to get the chest x-ray at the urgent care, and then be sent to the hospital if needed for a swab test.

The access to the Urgent Care was complex. We had to drive to the back service door, park, call a phone number, a nurse came out, asked some questions, and then led Gary into the building.

Half an hour later I got a text from Gary I did not expect.

Surprise! In addition to administering the chest x-ray we expected, the nurse offered a nasal swab. Gary said she actually discouraged it — she said if he’d been sick for three weeks there probably wouldn’t be any virus left in his nose. He said “No, my wife has a compromised immune system and I need to know everything.”

When he came out, I asked if the nasal swab was as bad as they say. According to Gary, yes, it’s bad. His right eye was still watering. I was going to kid him about having a long thing violate him in a sensitive, internal place and how he might get a bladder infection. I didn’t, though, since it seems swabs are his new love language.

He actually got three tests: the chest x-ray, the nasal swab, and the antibody test. So far the chest x-ray did not show any covid pneumonia: the doctor called with those results a few hours later. Gary’s pulse oxygen was at 93%, which was a little lower than expected. (The home pulse oximeter has said 95-97%.) I don’t know when the swab and antibody tests are expected. Probably sometime Tuesday or Wednesday.

Ugh - Answers Delayed

Gary got the call from the urgent care yesterday morning — and they put him off until Monday. He says he’s fine, but of course on top of his angry protestations that he’s fine, he lists his symptoms.

I’M FINE I’M JUST CONFUSED

I’M FINE I’M JUST DIZZY

I’M FINE I’M JUST FEVERISH 

NO DON’T TAKE MY TEMPERATURE

I AM FINE

And then on Monday ... all he gets is a chest X-Ray. After that then we get to have the debate about getting swabbed. I’m compiling my arguments already. I plan to tell him he has an obligation to be another statistic that makes the President look bad. 

Gary Gets Officially Sick

Thursday Gary felt great. He’s been saying for weeks that he had the covid but was showing no fever. It’s been this running commentary.

Him: “My toes hurt ...my eye hurts ... I am so tired ... I am sweating like a pig ...”

Me: “Get a test. Tell the doctor. Don’t tell me. I can’t treat you.”

Him: “I feel so fatigued ...” Repeat. But then Thursday he was fine.

On Friday morning, after I heard that often there is no fever with the Covid, I said what I think were the magic words: “I BELIEVE you have the virus. You don’t have to convince me.” I think this turned him to a new purpose: Proving Me Wrong. After weeks of “I am sick,” he switched to “I am fine. I will show you.”

He felt good in the morning, then he lay down on his back, and after he found he couldn’t breathe in that position, he actually sent an email to the doctor.

He almost immediately got a call from someone at Washington University Medical Center, and evidently he’s been doing all the right steps and is slated for a test (supposedly) sometime today. 

So, hopefully today he’ll get all sorted out. 

The Best Show Since the Beginning of the Pandemic

Of all the things a I’ve been binge-watching — Ozark, WestWorld, Buzzfeed Unsolved — I think the most enjoyable recently was the Backyard Show, in which we spend time watching what’s going on in the backyard.

The Dim-witted Momma raccoon continues to crawl over the neighbors’ fence and disappear into their backyard. I think maybe the reason she seems to vanish is that she climbs the fence so slowly, then pivots and goes down the fence so slowly ... and then I think she runs like hell. That’s why she seems to disappear. 

Soon it will be June, and we will have the baby skunks. We have at least four GlamourSkunks now. Last week two of them appeared in the videos, flanking a raccoon, like bookends.

The most enthralling thing was when the Cooper’s Hawk arrived and ate a raven. We didn’t know it was a raven at the time, we just knew that a Cooper’s Hawk that looked to be wearing leg warmers kicked and shredded a big pair of black legs sticking up out of a big pile of black feathers. We put it together with the video later. This was the order of video images: 1) giant eye-catching raven, 2) no raven, 3) nothing on camera but a close up of the tail of a Cooper’s Hawk. I guess he finished and was surveying his killing field.

The spectacle was gross but very entertaining. It was like a True Crime series.

Male Illness

My brother: the biopsy of his lymph node shows no cancer, and his bile duct cells are abnormal but not cancerous. So ... technically he’s fine. He hasn’t been told what might have caused the weight loss, or the constricted bile duct, but since his blood work is fine again I think everyone’s going to drop it until the Covid is gone. 

My husband: Gary also has an undiagnosed something now. He sneezes a lot, is fatigued, coughs half as much as he sneezes, and his lungs do feel stiff. For two non-consecutive days had a fever of 99.1. He definitely has something. His toes feel stiff but are not blue like “Covid toes.” His eyes feel bleary but are not pink (pink eye is the new Covid toe). 

In both cases, anything I say other than wailing “please don’t die” will be seen as heartless and dismissive.  I want to go on record saying I don’t want anyone to die. I really don’t.

I do want one place to quietly whisper, “You might have bile stones, and you, Gary, you might have a really bad cold.” It could be. But I can’t say that, just in case.

Covid Chinese Toilet Paper

Early on in the pandemic, Gary purchased some toilet paper on Amazon. 

It took a long time to get here from China.

People have very small bottoms in China.

On the left: Wee Chinese Toilet Paper.

On the right: Mega rolls of Cottonelle. (Not Charmin, though, which was the ultimate. Ah! The days of luxury. I remember sitting at the barbecue at Tara, wiping our lips with lace and our bottoms with Charmin.)

Spunky Labia International Toe Porn Superstar at the bottom, shown for scale.

 

Slumber Party

Last night, Gary and I ordered a pizza for the first time in two years. It was a no-contact delivery pizza. You pay and tip on-line and they just put it on the doorstep. Much better than listening to Gary making small talk with the delivery person.

The excitement of the carbs, combined with the usual global pandemic worries, meant I couldn’t sleep at all. At about 2:30 I found Gary in his room. He was still awake, too.

“I can’t sleep,” I complained. “Do you want to play our game?”

”Sure,” he said. 

And that’s how we found ourselves eating Doritos and playing Mansions of Madness from 2:30 - 4:30 last night. 

I’m sure there’s a deleted scene from Mrs. Miniver when the family does the same thing.

A Little Nervous

Yesterday, Gary said, “We need to leave the house and buy peanuts for the raccoons.”

”We?” I thought, loudly. And I am certain my left eyebrow echoed that.

I thought of the video we’ve all seen of women walking around downtown Kosovo as bullets fly. I’ve often wondered what on earth drew those women out of their houses. Now I know. The raccoons needed peanuts.

This may turn into a fight. Or, it may turn into a negotiation. I may trade leaving the house for getting Gary to stay in. I have wanted to try curbside pickup at the grocery, instead of Gary having walk in. Gary tends to walk in, buy his staples (potato chips and ice cream) and walk out. The shopping list is on his phone. He claims there is no bacon on the shelves. I have seen bacon and I ordered it on Instacart.

If that runs out I seriously will butcher and eat a raccoon.

Birthday Month

How is this month different from all other months? It is Gary’s Birthday Month. He woke me up at midnight March 1 to remind me. This means we must follow Birthday Month Rules: he does no chores and wins all fights.

That’s why I was so surprised to hear him vacuuming his La-z-boy and mattress this week. He’s still suffering from the dust that got in his body and spurred this Type B flu episode that of course he now suspects might be the 1% of Corona virus cases that don’t present with a fever. 

One might think that because he did a chore he might be picking fewer fights, but he’s been particularly feisty this month. 

As you know, the Pence Coronavirus updates have been required TV viewing in our house, and he spends so much time yelling over the VP that I can’t follow what is going on. I complained, and now he pauses the TV while he yells, so now the half hour update takes an hour.

Then I asked him to stop pausing and turn on the closed captioning so then at least I can read the information when I can’t hear it over “LIES! THEY’RE JUST FUCKING LYING! WHAT, DOES HE THINK WE’RE STUPID” (and on, and on, and on).

He said, “NO, I WILL NOT TURN ON THE CLOSED CAPTIONING, IT IS MY BIRTHDAY MONTH. AND I’M SICK.” So, sick rules and birthday rules combine in a perfect storm. This is not going to be a good month. 

Gary Adds to His Device Collection

This week Gary added two items to his vast collection of objects he will never use. I assume that I am meant to use them. This is perplexing because these objects have no purpose in our home.

Item One: The Fancy Dyson Ball Vacuum

If you look at our basement stairs you will see every inch of carpet in our house. So of course, he has bought a vacuum. What happened was, he noticed there was a spot behind a nightstand that the Roomba didn’t get to, so he got out the Dustbuster, and it blew some dust back into his face that provoked a sneeze that escalated into a cold that is now Type B flu, the kind you can have without a fever, Ellen, you heartless cow.

So now we have a vacuum (with attachments) that he ... we ... that I can use to get behind that nightstand.

Item Two: The Boiled Egg Peeler

Gary’s been fascinated by this concept since the commercial appeared on MSNBC. You put hard boiled eggs in this device, shake it, and the shells come right off. We got the single serving one, because he ... we ... because I only eat one egg at a time.

You may be familiar with the “Have It Oeuf” version from Bridget Jones Diary:

... but ours looks like this:

I looked at it and told him, “This is useless. I don’t eat hard-boiled eggs. I like soft-boiled eggs. Besides, I bet I can shell an egg faster than that thing.”

So the race was on and the stopwatch was set. It took me fifteen seconds to shell an egg. But the device? Shake, shake, done. It makes a web of cracked egg bits connected by the egg membrane, which you still have to slide off. One extra shake, though, and you just have a damp mess of shell and egg.

And of course it doesn’t work on soft-boiled eggs (I tried: damp mess of shell and yolk) so there’s nothing I can use it for. Much like the fancy vacuum. It will just sit in the collection, useless.

Gary and the Dow

The MSNBC crawl said, “Dow has biggest one-day point drop in history.”

I said to Gary, “That’s misleading. I would prefer to know the percentage of the drop, not the raw number of points.”

“NO NO DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND THIS IS AWFUL.”

”It’s awful, but it’s not the most awful -“

”IT’S THE BIGGEST POINT DROP IN HISTORY. DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND? PEOPLE BUY INTO THE MARKET AND WHEN THE POINTS GO UP - “

“Seriously, you’re mansplaining the market to me?”

”WELL CLEARLY YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND!” And then he doggedly explained the concept of buy low, sell high, ignoring the fact I am federally licensed to buy low and sell high.

But I didn’t give up. “Even if it drops 10,000 in a day, that’s still not a big enough percentage to halt trading. It’d have to be ... like .... 2,000 points — “

”YOU ARE WRONG.”

I tried what I thought was a genius move. “If Trump says more women are employed today than ever in history, you know that’s only true because the population’s bigger, right? The percentage of women working could have plummeted —“

Surprisingly, that didn’t work: it just provoked more of the same. Buy low, sell high, hopefully you don’t say things like that at work or they’ll think you’re dumb, just looking out for you so you don’t embarrass yourself. (Don’t get mad on my behalf. I was openly laughing at him at this point.)

(I’m going to say this next paragraph to you all because Gary wouldn’t listen when I tried to say it to him. I know you know this. I’m womansplaining as a mainsplaining reaction. Actually, I should use the term Garysplaining, because all men aren’t like that.

Anyway, during the crash around 90 years ago, stocks took four days to go from 350 index points to 200, or 42%. Over the entire year it slid to 41 points, almost 90%. Over the last four days we went 28,105 to 25,430. 2,675 points. Almost 10%. Bad, sure, but not the worst in history. Only the “worst in history” because the amount of stock has grown.)

Of course, then they put one of these graphs on the screen and further freaked him out. 


I didn’t even try to point out the x and y axis intersection was at 25,000. Why should I? He wants to be afraid.

Night Visitor

The other night we backed out of the garage and saw a deer on our corner. It froze (yes, like a deer in the headlights).

”Deer!” Gary gasped. He then adopted the special tone we reserve for the deer. “Hello, sweetie! Are you here to visit us?”

The deer, as if it could hear, bounded into our backyard. 

People. The joy. The JOY. I’ve never seen Gary so delighted. All Gary could talk about for miles was how our yard was beloved by the deer above all other yards in the neighborhood. That deer could tell we were heading off for the evening, and he knew he could chill in our yard, drink water in the heated bird bath, look in the windows, and just relax.

And really, Gary is so adorable I see why the deer visit him. I’m surprised deer, squirrels and raccoons don’t prance at his feet every time he walks outside, like he’s Cinderella. 

How One Get Ones Husband to Play His Drum Set

Gary’s hasn’t been playing his drums. I thought it was because his hands hurt from arthritis, or else he doesn’t want to get sweaty, or it eats into his Facebooking time.

As it turns out, he just hasn’t felt the subliminal nudge that gets him downstairs to play the drums. It appears there is a very specific nudge: I have to practice playing Vincent (Starry, Starry Night) on my guitar. 

The last two times I’ve played that, I have listened through two closed doors as Gary has gotten out of his recliner, gone downstairs, and interrupted my practice session to bang on his drums. 

I don’t know what neuron that song triggers in his brain. It was released in March 1972, when Gary was 18. Perhaps it evokes memories of parental expectations? 

More likely it’s a floaty song that I’m playing with no rhythm, and he needs to subconsciously rock out hard to restore order to the universe.

Gary Almost Surprises Me

I could hear Gary watching television in the next room. It was s some period drama, with duchesses and arranged marriages and plummy English accents.

I was trying to work out what it was. The heroine’s name was Georgiana. ”Is it one of the Trollope novels?” I wondered. ”There’s no Georgiana in Austen, is there? Also ... why isn’t he inviting me in there? Why is he watching it alone .... oh! I know what it is.”

It was The Duchess. We saw it in the theatre when it came out in 2008, and I’m certain he’s forgotten all of it ... except for the lesbian love scene. 

I came out to tease him. He denied watching it for the lesbian scene. “No! I just like this movie. But there are lesbians in it too?”

I rolled my eyes. After I walked away, I heard him say “Awesome!”

Golden Eagle

The time Gary spotted a bald eagle he called me from the road immediately.

This time he was home for two hours before he mentioned it. This most recent eagle was a Golden Eagle instead of a bald eagle, and it was in a busy intersection, not on the winding back road.

I’m sure the next eagle he sees he won’t even mention it. And also, why don’t I see any eagles? I’m on the roads more than he is.

It is nice to see the eagles without paying $400, like you usually do to see the Eagles.

Hand

Yesterday we went to the moves and saw The Turning. (Ah, yesterday, when I didn’t know how completely they could destroy Henry James.)

During the opening credits Gary snuggled a little closer to me. I felt something touch my shoulder, and I glanced over, and saw this:

He had smuggled our fake dead hand into the theater and was using it to caress my shoulder. 

I had to stifle my laughter. I wish I could say I jumped. It probably would have been more effective if he had waited until a scary part, but well enough: there were no scary parts.

Gary’s Capacity for Argument

There are a number of reasons why I get along better with Gary now that he’s retired, and one is because he has found Facebook. Facebook is Gary’s argument outlet now instead of me.

And MY GOD how he can argue. While the rest of us stay in our bubble of generally like-minded friends, Gary seeks out people who will debate him on Facebook. 

One of Gary’s Facebook friends debate partners is one guy, D______, who is as red as Gary is blue. Gary will state his opinion on Facebook, D_______ will counter with the opposite, and the debate will go on for pages. 

Gary says climate change / ridiculous border wall / Saint Hilary, then D______ says hoax / stealing our jobs / criminal mastermind, and my friends say who is this D______ guy and how does your husband know him?

It’s quite nice someone else gets to be Con to Gary’s overwrought Pros.

Saint Louis Post-Dispatch Subscription

Reasons why Gary signed up for six months delivery of the local paper at a ridiculous fee:

• Gary loves Rachel Maddow. She frequently tells him we should support our local paper, and he wants Rachel to love him back.
• Gary loves me, and the salesman used that. When the salesman asked where we got our news, I said ”I just need to answer a few questions in the on-line version of the Post-Dispatch and I can read anything I want.” He said, “Well, that’s one way, but if you subscribe to the delivery you can get the on-line version for free.” He then immediately looked at Gary as if to say, “Are you a monster? Why are you making your wife click on questions?”
• Gary loves animals. When I argued that the paper makes a lot of trash, the salesman said, “Oh, you can donate used papers to animal shelters. They always need a lot of newspapers to line the cages.”

So I’ve only once come inside and winged the uncollected paper at him, and I’ve said only one dry thing about the accumulating trash. (“If you’re worried about snow falling on top of the raccoon’s food you should cover it in a layer of newspaper.”) 

Yet, I am beginning to warm up to it. Yesterday I sat next to him while he was reading it, and he asked, “Do you want some of the paper?”

I don’t know why, but that got me. Sharing the paper is the type of thing an old couple in love does.

The Amazing Ellen: Update

Well, Hellstromism practice with Gary went better than expected. His hand did give away where the object was that he was thinking of. He didn’t yank me off my feet, but he truly swung his hand like a compass needle toward the object.

Sadly, we were doing it in our great room, and it’s just not big enough or grid-like enough to do a real test. I’ll just have to have him place the object somewhere in the house instead of somewhere in the great room. 

Toward the end, he began to argue with me. He asked why I wasn’t talking to him to reveal where the object was.

I said, ”Why would I talk to you to find the hidden object? You’re supposed to think of the object and I’m supposed to read your mind.”

”No. You keep up a patter and ask me questions that make me reveal where the object is.” Blatant “mansplaining.” Well, mansplaining would be if he explained something we both know. I know how it’s done, and he doesn’t.

I sighed, ”No patter. That’s not how it’s done.”

”Yes it is.” He actually said that. “It’s all done with the patter. You can’t actually read my mind, and talking to me is the only way to tell what’s in my mind.”

”Nope.” Mind you, I’m saying this while I have his wrist daintily pinched between my thumb and index finger. 

“Listen to me. You need to work on your patter.”

”Sure. Whatever. Is it the lamp?”

Of course, it was the lamp. And he was not adequately amazed. That pissed me off as much as the mansplaining, frankly.

Bald Eagle

It is so hard to shake what you learn as a child. For example, bald eagles: I know they aren’t endangered anymore, but when a young girl goes to Washington D.C. in 1976 and sees a bald eagle at the zoo and hears that there only a few of our nation’s symbols left, and she interprets that to mean there’s only this Eagle at the zoo and his immediate family somewhere in the back, that’s hard to shake.

We’ve gone Eagle watching in our area, but it was an hour drive, and of course there were no Bald Eagles. While they aren’t endangered, they’re rare, right? They’re a Special Occasion Eagle, like when you need to start the baseball season, or raise money for your nature habitat.  

Gary called me Tuesday just after he left the house.

”A bald eagle just flew in front of my car.”

”Impossible,” I said. ”Maybe it was some other kind of eagle.”

”It was a bald eagle. I almost saluted. It took off from the road ahead of me and flew up into a tree.”

I immediately did some research and not only was it a bald eagle, it is the season when bald eagles like to come to the nearby river, and they like to pick roadkill off the roads, and one of my friends just saw one a few streets over a few days back.

It was lucky that Gary didn’t run over it when it was in the road, because there’s be a hefty fine for that. Wait - no - that was back in the seventies. Or maybe not - someone was just in big trouble for shooting one. The laws regarding bald eagles seem very inconsistent.

Art Is Open To Interpretation, I Guess

So, this was the end result of the teacups. 

It has its flaws, but I still I went ahead and framed it and told Gary we were giving it to his parents.

This is how he hung it up over at their house.

I’m sure if I had opted for a standard still life, with erect teacups and a bowl that sits on its base, there would have been no problem. Instead, he decided that since there are no visual clues he would just make the objects in the still life defy gravity.

I made him call his parents so they could correct it. He called while I was at work, and because he didn’t listen to my explicit directions, the bowl is now on the bottom. Still wrong.

And it’s even signed, faintly, in the bottom right. I thought the teacups were pretty realistic. Evidently not.

Gary's Contribution to the Christmas Tree

Gary commemorated the purchase of the second Toto toilet with his contribution to the Christmas tree.

Marriage is compromise.

Gary’s Comment

Gary complains sometimes that I don’t respond often enough when he’s speaking to me. There’s a certain amount of “oh” and “um-hmm” he requires. (No actual words, that’s interrupting, can’t have that.)

The last time he demanded to know that I was listening, I responded sarcastically with an overly loud and animated ”UM-HMM,” which prompted him to call me ...

An “insolent bitch.“

The “bitch” part rolled right off, because it’s true, particularly after that “UM-HMM,” buuuuut ... ”insolent?”

I thought about it a moment before I began laughing uncontrollably. Insolent? Insolent! Have I completely misread the household dynamic? Here I thought we were equals; evidently, I am an underling. An insolent underling.

We made up soon after, but you know next time he acts up I’m playing the insolence card. “Be quiet, you insolent puppy!” “Shut your insolent mouth.” “I shall not abide such insolence!”

Pre-Concert BS by the Traitorous Husband

Months ago we both tickets to see Kathleen Madigan downtown on 11/9.

Evening of of 11/8: Gary said, “I feel bad.” I began organizing my list of friends I could call upon to step in when Gary flakes.

Morning of 11/9: Gary said, “I feel pretty good.”

Late morning of 11/9, Gary said, “I don’t feel good.” 

I contacted two friends, but neither of them could take Gary’s ticket. As I was calling my third friend, Gary said, “I can go. I’ll be fine.”

Thirty years of this made me reply, “No, you’re just jacking me around,” and I kept dialing the next friend in my list.

“No. Stop,” he said. “Really, I’ll be fine. I want to go.”

Five minutes before we were going to leave, he said, and does this shock you, “I can’t go. I’m too sick.” 

There was some screaming, and the one friend I contacted right after that call could probably report how disgusted I sounded, but of course she had plans as well. There was no time, of course, so I just put out a call on Facebook that if anyone wanted to meet me downtown before the concert I had a free ticket, which of course went to waste, because the only taker saw it too late. This caused me to waste the pre-paid parking ticket as well, because I didn’t want to hike three blocks alone downtown at night, but I made it into the next-door Blues hockey parking garage before it closed.

Once in my seat, I offered Gary’s seat to the woman on the other side of it. It turns out she was there alone because HER worthless ticket-wasting husband did the same thing, only his excuse was, “I just don’t feel like going,” and he had pulled the same stunt before with Elton John tickets. We bonded, obviously. (Her husband didn’t waste cruise tickets by forgetting his passport, but he did waste a shore excursion because he went back for his hat and missed the boat.)

I was very fortunate to encounter a fellow sufferer. (I am a little surprised she spoke to me, given that he betrayed me while my hair was still un-fixed, which means I stomped out of the house and I hadn’t done anything but dry the roots, so it was just chunks of splayed hair.)

Later, during the act, I noticed there were other empty seats in our row. How many seats belonged to other seat-wasting dogs-in-the-manger who jacked their wives around? Live and learn. In the future, I will not believe the “No, really, I’m fine,” mid-morning dodge, and just go ahead and get another date.

Physical Solutions

I thought of something to make cold and flu season more tolerable.

(It doesn't involve avoiding colds or the flu, though I have been washing my hands several times a day, and I confess I considered wearing gloves at work. I'm not full-on germaphobe, though. A little girl coughed in my face on Halloween and I didn't wash it off.)

In our house, when a cold or flu or sore throat gets bad enough, we do reach for symptomatic relief, stubborn though we are. Usually the symptomatic relief is all jumbled under the bathroom sink. I've tried to organize it, but still, rooting under the bathroom sink with a head cold is hard. Rooting around under the bathroom sink when your husband has a head cold is hard too. ("ELLEN GET ME SOME COUGH DROPS THE NEW ONES NOT THE STALE ONES.")

But now, after my great idea, all the medicines are easily accessed from a chest-level shelf in the linen closet.

Now when Gary feels a cold coming on, he just reaches in the linen closet for the cold/flu container in the back, and perhaps he might pluck a few pills from the pill container on the right. If he has a sore throat, instead of whispering, "ellen my throat's sore get me some sucrets the red ones not the green ones" he can even ... well, one of us can plunk the sore throat container on the bathroom counter for the duration of the illness and browse at will.

Oh, and for those who are thinking, “Damn, that’s a lot of drugs,” what you see here is a drug larder. It’s our in-home personal pharmacy. It is stocked full of NyQuil backups and four boxes of Tylenol Cold and Flu capsules so there will be no 2 a.m. runs to the store. There are also medicines for illness we’ll probably never get again: weird one-off creams for plantar warts and gels for tooth pain and pills for bladder infections. (Sigh.)

Many linens had to be exiled to the basement to make this work, but I think it will be worth it. 

Soda at the Movies

Gary is loyal. Some might call it “stubborn and set in his ways,” but I call it loyal. For example, he has a favorite movie theater. There’s nothing great or special about this theater. The only thing I like about it is that they finally repainted it a grown-up maroon, instead of the carnival of purple / yellow / purple and yellow paint jobs it has had over the last 30 years.

Inside the theater, he has a favorite screen, and it is the Bistro screen, where you can order food and drinks. He never orders there, but for some reason he likes it best.

This last time we went to the theater, a staffer saw Gary in line for a soda and said to me,  “You guys are going to the Bistro screen, right? He should order the soda there.”

”Oh, he doesn’t like to do that.”

”It’s cheaper ordering it in there.”

”Doesn’t matter to him.’’

The guy confessed. “You’re required to order something now if you’re in the Bistro theater. It’s a new rule.”

”Oh, then I’ll let him know.” And I thought, “He won’t like this at all.”

Gary grumbled as I told him, but then he sighed loudly and agreed. He tried to order the soda at the entrance from the hostess, but she insisted we go ahead to our seats and use the call button.

We sat down, hit the call button, and then Gary asked me if I had any singles, since all he had were fives and tens. Why? Because we had to tip the woman when she brought the soda.

”No, I don't, but you don’t have to ... oh, never mind, of course you do. Use your card?”

”I’m not doing that. This is awful. I hate this.”

And it was awful. He handed her a five, said “keep the change,” then she came back and said it was $5.13. So he handed her a ten, and said “Keep the change,” because speaking of change, he cannot. He growled, “I hate this. We can never use the Bistro screen again.” He then offered me a sip of his soda. “Wanna try this? It’s a fifteen dollar soda.”

Car Note

Gary came home with a note someone left him.

The note read:

"Yes, the hippies were right! And I also lived through that era. Just read a new book called "Poisoner in Chief" - appalling what was going on by the evil genius in the CIA."

On the back of the note was a list ("Swerve, garlic powder, price celery").

"What is this?" I asked.

"Oh, it's just a note. Someone put it in a Baggie and stuck it on my car at the store."

"You mean a stranger?"

"Yes. It's happened before. Just throw it away."

I did throw it away, then I fished it out of the trash and took a photo.

So, clearly written by a woman because men don't put circles in their exclamation points, and clearly written to Gary, because he has long white hippie hair now and was probably wearing his "Resist" t-shirt.

Of course, it's possible this woman is just a random writer out at the Florissant Dierbergs store, jotting down book reviews regarding spies and MK Ultra and slapping them on rainy car windows.

Probably a blogger, down on her luck; still needs to weigh in.

Gary's Magical Migraine Thinking

Gary has spent almost eight years now with his chronic persistent migraine. The pain has lessened since the horror of his initial episode. He's taking extra epilepsy medication now for the headaches, so his epilepsy symptoms have backed off as well, which is a nice bonus.

For some reason, two weeks ago his migraine symptoms bumped up. The nausea was back, the light sensitivity, the painful watery eyes, the fatigue. He says it isn't as bad as the first time. After reviewing blog posts from that era, I'd say his level of pain may not be as bad as what sent him to the hospital, but it's as bad as the first month living with the medicated migraine.

This is how Gary is dealing with this recurrence of the persistent migraine.

1. He has bought a special bamboo pillow specifically for side sleepers, because he believes the way he sleeps on his pitiful thirty-year old pillows may be pressing on his trigeminal nerve and exacerbating his migraine. He tried it a few days and it was not the answer.
2. He stopped eating his preferred vegetable course for every meal: grape tomatoes. On any day we have four containers of grape tomatoes in the house because he will suck up one container as a snack. This one worked for several hours.
3. He stopped eating the thin slices of salami he prefers, because they contain some migraine-triggering element in food that begins with an A. This worked for several days.
4. He switched his drugs around so he takes his nighttime drugs in the morning and vice versa. He came out the next morning and announced that it did not work. I asked if he really thought a drug change would work after one day.
5. He bought a top-of-the-line eyepatch because he thought too much light might be getting into his right eye and inflaming his optic nerve. This ... do I have to say it ... did not work.
6. He had some pie, because he read that some people get migraine relief from comfort food. This did work for six hours.
7. He decided that changing up his diet so much was what was causing his migraine.

He came home a few days ago and said that his migraine had spread to his teeth, back, and belly. "GO TO THE DOCTOR," I said, loudly, perhaps too loudly to a man who can't unload the dishwasher because the noise sends him to his bed.

"You are an awful nurse!" he grouched. This is true. Also, he is an awful doctor.

Tips for Dealing with Retired Husbands

...well, at least my retired husband.

I thought when husbands retire, the biggest problem is boredom. They have too much time on their hands, then they have to start projects around the house or have affairs.

I haven't seen that with Gary. Instead, he has issues because now that he's retired he doesn't get to be an expert any more. He hates not knowing as much or more than the next guy, and now the next guy is usually an actual expert - a car mechanic, a doctor, a cable installer.

So now I have scheduled into every day a fifteen minute period of sitting on a footstool literally at my husband's knee so he can explain things to me.

If I know we're going to be encountering an expert I try to remind Gary that the expert is only an expert in one field - when it comes to breadth of knowledge Gary wins, with his expertise on physics, animal behavior, cooking, etc..

It's exhausting, but better than having him start projects around the house.

Right of Way

Gary and I were sitting at a three-way stop sign, where we had arrived at the same time as one other car.

"Go!" Gary said, "You have the right of way!"

I went, while saying, "Why? Why do I have the right of way?"

"Because you were the person on the right." And of course with the way were were configured that was true.

The I became suspicious. I know he knows more about traffic rules than I do, but I worry sometimes because a lot of his right-of-way answers seem to hinge on the fact that the word "right" is in the answer. People making a right turn go first. People in the right lane go first. Yield to the person on the right.

Then he threw in a curve ball. "Even though he was closest to the intersection."

"How is that possible? We were both sitting at the intersection. How could one of us be closer?"

"He was right where the two roads meet, and you were on a two lane road so you were one lane further away."

Other women have to worry about finances when their partner dies, I'm going to have to study up on what to do at a stop sign.

Opossum

See this animal? What type of animal is it?

Gary is convinced it's a rat. After he's seen 10,000 opossums coming to eat at the Wildlife Buffet, he looks at this one and thinks it's a rat.

I said, "We can't be the ones who draw rats to the neighborhood. That's it for the - "

"It's a white rat. Look how clean and well-groomed it is. It's someone's pet that got out."

"It's just a skinny hyperactive opossum. We've had white opossums befo - "

"That's a pet white rat. Rats make great pets."

"Do you want a pat rat? Is that what this - "

"I know white rats, I worked with them in biology class. Some kid in our neighborhood is letting his rat run free at night. Rats bond really tightly with humans. He's coming here to eat and then going back to his human family like a cat."

He did not say the rat was named "Remy" or anything in particular, he did not give it any laboratory escapee back story, but he would not budge on the rat designation.

I then had to research the distinctions between rats and opossums. Evidently opossums have a flat back, while rats are hunched, and opossums snouts are longer that rat snouts. Granted, it isn't exhibiting typical opossum behavior. It does seem a bit furtive. This opossum has a little spring in its step. But, how would any animal act that just discovered a giant pile of manna?

Gary’s New Driving Role

Gary has made some poor driving decisions lately. They haven’t been unsafe, just alarming. He gets distracted, especially if he’s busy declaiming about something, and he turns off his brain and drives by muscle memory. There are stoplights near our house, and if no one else is around to follow, he will stop at the stoplight, which is fine, only often the stoplight is green. I don’t react well when he does this. 

I am happy to say that he’s decided I can take over driving duties when we’re together. He can expound and I can drive though the green lights. Granted, he feels a little useless, but then it occurred to him that if there is an accident, the passenger can hurl himself between the driver and the steering wheel. That way, if the airbag doesn’t deploy, Gary will absorb the impact.

He calls this “being the bloodbag.”

Gary and His New Friends

Last week we went out to lunch. I went to the bathroom, came back, and found Gary talking to all six people at the next table.

"YOU KNOW SOME PEOPLE WON'T EAT BOLOGNA BUT HOW COULD YOU NOT EAT IT HERE IT'S REALLY GREAT EVERYTHING HERE IS GREAT." (Salt and Smoke on St. Charles Main Street, if you're wondering.)

I sat down. "I see you've met my husband." They laughed, but they seemed happy that he joined their conversation. I mean, it's not like this is England, or some other place where strangers keep to themselves.

Then, a few days later, we were at Waffle House. (Lots of meals out because Gary has evidently lost interest in being the family chef.) He was paying the bill at the counter and said to a little girl, in a normal tone so as not to frighten her, "I see you have some bacon there."

The girl said nothing, because what do you say to "I see you have some bacon there?"

He continued, "Do you like bacon? It's good isn't it?"

The girl said nothing, because her father was right there and his body language said, "Stranger Danger."

According to Gary, the girl gave him "a look" that said, "This IS some damn fine bacon, but still I'm here with my estranged Dad at a Waffle House and we haven't said anything to each other this whole meal, so I'm not going to chat YOU up."

(I added on that last part. According to Gary, the girl just gave him a "wise" look that indicated the "appreciated the bacon.")

Still! I mean! Engaging strangers in conversation about pork products! Such behavior, when he could just have a blog.

Sick Sink

I was cleaning out the refrigerator and found a Tupperware dish containing half cherries and half green mold. (Optimistically, half-full of cherries.)

Gary saw we dumping the glop down the garbage disposal.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING? YOU CAN'T DO THAT! IT POISONS THE SINK!"

I stopped. "What are you talking about?"

"YOU CAN'T PUT THAT IN THE SINK! YOU'LL MAKE THE SINK SICK!"

I stared blankly at him. Then I turned on the disposal and ran the water. Then I lifted my left eyebrow at him.

"THAT DOESN'T DO ANYTHING! WE HAVE MOLD MOLECULES IN OUR SINK NOW!"

Seriously. Does he have a point? Should I have put the green mold in the trash? Burned it? Put the Tupperware in an autoclave? What would a normal person do?

New Treat for Gary

What is Gary's favorite drink? Bailey's Irish Cream.

What is Gary's favorite treat? Premium ice cream.

What have they invented just so Gary can have both his favorite things at once?

The box claims that "For this indulgent treat, we topped a rich dark chocolate cookie with luscious Irish Cream infused ice cream swirled with silky chocolate fudge then dipped it in decadent dark chocolate with a white chocolate drizzle."

He even prefers dark chocolate. He is in heaven.

Each contains less than 0.5 percent alcohol. How many would he have to eat to get drunk? He could do it.