OT: the Tao of Married life | Page 11 | The Boneyard

OT: the Tao of Married life

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Hankster

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Lost count on how many times I wanted to get it off my chest. However, I was concerned that my stories will be labeled as Science Fiction. One or two short stories. Not sure if this qualifies for this thread...so here goes.

When I first retired back in '96, I chose to drive tour bus. I love to travel so what an opportunity. The day before I was to leave for a 1 week trip to Stowe, my wife mentioned about painting the interior of the house. She also pointed out that the dry wall looked terrible. indentations, a few small hairline cracks from house settling. I actually agreed with her. I explained that the walls needed to be repaired/prepared prior to doing any painting.

Oh I forgot. Prior to retiring I was teaching at a Leadership Academy in WWII buildings.

Okay, so I leave and come back a week later. I walked upstairs and froze. There was the whole inside painted. Looking familiar, I realized that the whole inside was painted the same color of my old classroom!!!!!!!!!!!!! I dropped my suitcase and it started down the stairs. My daughter worked on post where I was. The story goes that they were throwing the paint away. So guess what. What made it worse, the walls were the same. Dents, hair line cracks, little zits where you pick off via fingernails. End of the story, Cost me over $2500 to do everything.

One more. One day, on a Sunday, my wife (still the same one) says, she would like to paint the back bedroom. I said okay. She asks to go to Lowes and pick out some colors. We did and of course the other tools of the trade were bought. So stupid me, I am figuring this for a later date, sometime during the week. We get home and I start watching TV. It had to be the start of fall or very early Spring. It was still chilled outside. Well my wife walks by me and heads down stairs. Her attire was not the best. old jeans, old top, paint stained hat. I started to shake, sweat and develop stomach cramps. I looked at the clock and it was 4pm. What are you doing I asked? Paint the bedroom....why? Two hours later she is sitting on the floor painting. The smooth strokes turned to slapping. I knew something was wrong because she was also painting the outlets!!!!!!! At least the covers were off. I asked her to step away from the brush. She was painting everything. Her eyes looked like she just shot up a bag of H. Most of the time her actions occur when I am away for a week. When I go away I dread coming home.

Who do I blame? Her of course, but also the DIY and Home and Garden shows. I plan on suing both those channels. This has been going on for years. Anyway, I don't know if this fits in the title Tao. Also let me mention the dirty looks I got like I did something wrong.

Just a small example of early aging.

Don't get me started.
 
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You are on the money Deepster, Aunt flow is on the way. Should be here any minute now. Still gets under my skin!!

thats-what-i-do-i-drink-and-i-know-things-game-of-thrones.jpg
 
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Here is the basic plotline of 90% of my marriage life arguments.

Her (Sunday night): Could you pay the oil bill by Thursday?
Me: Sure.
Her (Monday evening): Did you pay the oil bill yet?
Me: No, I got tied up at work. I'll do it tomorrow.

At work on Tuesday afternoon, call the oil company....they tell me it was already paid this morning.

Me: Did you pay the oil bill? I said I'd take care of it today.
Her: I got tired of just waiting around for you to do it.

That happened about a trillion times. God, I love not being married.....
 
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Here is the basic plotline of 90% of my marriage life arguments.

Her (Sunday night): Could you pay the oil bill by Thursday?
Me: Sure.
Her (Monday evening): Did you pay the oil bill yet?
Me: No, I got tied up at work. I'll do it tomorrow.

At work on Tuesday afternoon, call the oil company....they tell me it was already paid this morning.

Me: Did you pay the oil bill? I said I'd take care of it today.
Her: I got tired of just waiting around for you to do it.

That happened about a trillion times. God, I love not being married.....

I can't even count how many times I've dealt with this.
 
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I can't even count how many times I've dealt with this.
Solved this a long time ago. I give her all the money, she pays the bills. All because I never bothered to reconcile my checkbook to the penny. Always had a buffer in my favor. Wasn't good enough.
 

August_West

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Solved this a long time ago. I give her all the money, she pays the bills. All because I never bothered to reconcile my checkbook to the penny. Always had a buffer in my favor. Wasn't good enough.

Thats what I do. She is taking it anyway, she might as well do the bills.
 
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Solved this a long time ago. I give her all the money, she pays the bills. All because I never bothered to reconcile my checkbook to the penny. Always had a buffer in my favor. Wasn't good enough.

I tried to let her do the bills for a while. I figured that when she saw where the money went and how bad we were piling up the debt, it would open her eyes. It didn't. It just taught her how to juggle the money more, pay stuff late, transfer debt to new credit cards with "0% interest" and our financial position got even worse.
 
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Does this Tao work for women too? If it does I'd like to complain about my husband ( deceased) but still fair game. Never took any tools with him to do any job, but had me looking for them once he started to work on anything in the house, which wasn't very often. Painted the kitchen without any tarp on the floor, so I had to scrape the paint off. Never changed a diaper, held a baby or fed them, never got up at night with a crying baby, could not be left alone with the babies, trust was involved for a reason. To top it all off, picked him up at the Hartford Hospital after heart surgery and where did he want to go. Mickey ads.

I should write a book.b there is so much more but it making me angry over again.
 

Hankster

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I tried to let her do the bills for a while. I figured that when she saw where the money went and how bad we were piling up the debt, it would open her eyes. It didn't. It just taught her how to juggle the money more, pay stuff late, transfer debt to new credit cards with "0% interest" and our financial position got even worse.
Same here. I retired and she had to pick up the slack for a bit. So she was paying the mortgage. Because I was the bill payer, I tried to give her OJT. She was not receptive. So, one day she came out to the kitchen to get a coffee to go. She put an envelope down on the counter to mail. I asked, what is that? She said it's the house payment. I screamed what????????????? That is due on the first!! Her reply? " today is the first." True story.

I mentioned in another thread don't get me started.
 
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I tried to let her do the bills for a while. I figured that when she saw where the money went and how bad we were piling up the debt, it would open her eyes. It didn't. It just taught her how to juggle the money more, pay stuff late, transfer debt to new credit cards with "0% interest" and our financial position got even worse.
Been there too, but I stopped worrying about and feel better now. Worth more dead than alive at this point anyway.
 

Hankster

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Does this Tao work for women too? If it does I'd like to complain about my husband ( deceased) but still fair game. Never took any tools with him to do any job, but had me looking for them once he started to work on anything in the house, which wasn't very often. Painted the kitchen without any tarp on the floor, so I had to scrape the paint off. Never changed a diaper, held a baby or fed them, never got up at night with a crying baby, could not be left alone with the babies, trust was involved for a reason. To top it all off, picked him up at the Hartford Hospital after heart surgery and where did he want to go. Mickey ads.

I should write a book.b there is so much more but it making me angry over again.
Touche' I think that is how it is spelled. To-shay.
 
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Solved this a long time ago. I give her all the money, she pays the bills. All because I never bothered to reconcile my checkbook to the penny. Always had a buffer in my favor. Wasn't good enough.

Well mine doesn't translate to bills, I bring the money home (so does she) and she handles all bills (and complains about it). But for example, Thursdays are garbage pick up days. I'm responsible for taking all trash out and getting it to the curb on time. She asks this morning if I'm taking the trash out, I say yes. I take some out and when I get back inside she is taking some out too. I just have to laugh. I said I would do it, but I guess that wasn't sufficient?
 

jleves

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Well mine doesn't translate to bills, I bring the money home (so does she) and she handles all bills (and complains about it). But for example, Thursdays are garbage pick up days. I'm responsible for taking all trash out and getting it to the curb on time. She asks this morning if I'm taking the trash out, I say yes. I take some out and when I get back inside she is taking some out too. I just have to laugh. I said I would do it, but I guess that wasn't sufficient?
Exactly! If I say I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it. You don't have to remind me every 6 months!
 
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Does this Tao work for women too? If it does I'd like to complain about my husband ( deceased) but still fair game. Never took any tools with him to do any job, but had me looking for them once he started to work on anything in the house, which wasn't very often. Painted the kitchen without any tarp on the floor, so I had to scrape the paint off. Never changed a diaper, held a baby or fed them, never got up at night with a crying baby, could not be left alone with the babies, trust was involved for a reason. To top it all off, picked him up at the Hartford Hospital after heart surgery and where did he want to go. Mickey ads.

I should write a book.b there is so much more but it making me angry over again.

Go make me a chicken pot pie.
 

AtlHusky

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I tried to let her do the bills for a while. I figured that when she saw where the money went and how bad we were piling up the debt, it would open her eyes. It didn't. It just taught her how to juggle the money more, pay stuff late, transfer debt to new credit cards with "0% interest" and our financial position got even worse.

I can totally relate. For the first 15 years from when the wife and I pooled income (about 25 years ago) she never worried about paying bills, I always took care of it. At some point along the way (roughly 10 years ago), after having two kids, she made it clear that we didn't have enough money left over to live on and she said she should pay the bills to see if that changed. We now make close to double the income that we did at that point, but we still don't have enough left to live on after paying the bills. I'm a cheap bastard and don't spend a whole lotta extra on "stuff". At least it's no longer my fault that there's no money left over...but do I blame her? Of course not!
 
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Fortunately, my wife is a saint, I spend money like a drunken sailor and she just kind of shakes her head and rolls her eyes. She does however ask fairly often do we really need 7 cars and another 3 in mid-restoration, so in a nod to practicality I'm thinning the herd to 4 and I've established a new personal record of not adding to the bourbon collection for the past two months which makes her pretty happy and me pretty sad.

However, she is rarely satisfied with my dishwashing still and has been known to point out that there is a difference between "straightening" and "cleaning" to which I say you married a guy not another woman.
 
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Does this Tao work for women too? If it does I'd like to complain about my husband ( deceased) but still fair game. Never took any tools with him to do any job, but had me looking for them once he started to work on anything in the house, which wasn't very often. Painted the kitchen without any tarp on the floor, so I had to scrape the paint off. Never changed a diaper, held a baby or fed them, never got up at night with a crying baby, could not be left alone with the babies, trust was involved for a reason. To top it all off, picked him up at the Hartford Hospital after heart surgery and where did he want to go. Mickey ads.

I should write a book.b there is so much more but it making me angry over again.
Sorry you put up with it. Don't think I could have. Hope things are better now.​
 
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This thread makes me want to buy my wife something - man she's an angel.
Mau enjoy her while it's great. I just hope you realize that everyone posting here, at one time or another, said the exact same thing.
 

David 76

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Does this Tao work for women too? If it does I'd like to complain about my husband ( deceased) but still fair game. Never took any tools with him to do any job, but had me looking for them once he started to work on anything in the house, which wasn't very often. Painted the kitchen without any tarp on the floor, so I had to scrape the paint off. Never changed a diaper, held a baby or fed them, never got up at night with a crying baby, could not be left alone with the babies, trust was involved for a reason. To top it all off, picked him up at the Hartford Hospital after heart surgery and where did he want to go. Mickey ads.

I should write a book.b there is so much more but it making me angry over again.

You win! An occasionally annoying wife is no match for this.
 
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I just read the entire post and it was a great read. Married 43 years yesterday and wanted to let you all know that I figured something out a long ago. I readily admit to being way more than 50% of the problem....BUT not the whole problem. She has earned her nickname of "Miss Direction" over and over, is never satisfied with my cleaning (she doesn't get that I don't see dirt), fights unfairly (brings up old girlfriends from 35 years ago), fails the logic test and then gets accuses me of being "always right" ...oh the double standard. I could go and on but my point is... I am glad she'll still have me.
 
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