How Many Times Do I Have to Tell You?

One of my regular blog reads, which I have mentioned here previously, is PassiveAggressiveNotes.com. I found one of the items posted yesterday to be particularly funny…

Who hasn’t seen examples of stuff like this?

In the aftermath of the little giggle this picture prompted, I got to thinking about passive-aggressive notes that could be found at my house.

I bet you’re thinking, “Uh oh. Now she’s going to bash her poor ole still-recovering Hubby.” But I’m not. He’s Superhubby, remember? He also happens to be an engineer. I could say he’s anal, but that sounds too negative. The fact is, he just likes orderliness. He likes things to be in their proper place. Which is not a bad thing. Otherwise, our house might be subject of a Hoarders episode on A&E.

You know what they say about opposites attracting? I am not orderly. I’m clean, mind you, I’m just not as driven to distraction by clutter or things being out of place. (If Hubby had a blog, he could post all kinds of crazy stuff about me.)

My Hubby is subtly passive-aggressive, i.e., he doesn’t leave notes, he leaves hints. We’ve been married for almost 17 years now, so I am pretty good at recognizing the hints.

I’ll pretend I’m Hubby and give you a couple of examples. But, BUT, before I do, I will be the first one to admit that he is right. His way is best. Order is better. My brain just doesn’t work like his does.

Here’s an example of the place I get hints most frequently. Especially when it’s Hubby’s week to make dinner.

Notice how cluttered the kitchen island is? That’s the workspace he likes to use when making dinner.

Here’s what the hint would look like…

That little brown cabinet at bottom left houses the trashcan. All of the stuff that was on the counter is now on top of or near said trashcan. Which means, “Keep the crap from cluttering the kitchen counter or I’ll throw it away.”

See? He’s right. The counter is much nicer when it is clutter-free. I just can’t put stuff in its place promptly. I do it in stages. It is not a conscious thing. I am not trying to push him over the edge, I swear.

Here’s an example of the second-most-frequent hint…

This shows the sinks in our bathroom. My sink is on the left. Hubby’s is on the right. That big white thing in the middle is Hubby’s. It’s no accident that his largest item is in the middle. It signifies the middle. Notice my hairbrush well to the right of the middle. My cuticle trimmers and hairspray are also slightly to the right (it gets much worse, but it is still early in the week). While you’re looking, take note of the red comb to the far right. That’s Hubby’s comb.

If I hadn’t just done this for the photo example, Hubby would’ve done it later today or tomorrow morning at the latest. My hairspray is nowhere to be seen, the cuticle trimmers are shoved under my sink bowl, the hairbrush has been moved to the middle, and his red comb has been inserted in my brush as if to say, “Um, Honey? Your stuff is on MY side again!” Red is certainly an appropriate color for the comb when used in this manner. I wonder if that was intentional?

Again, Hubby is right. It looks much neater this way. I’m being honest here. I did not set out to bash Hubby. That’s why I keep saying, “HE IS RIGHT.” I really just wanted to point out that he’s rubbing off on others, including the dog. Which dog? Why Belle, of course. Meg’s a bit wackier. (More like me, some might say.)

Belle and Meg both have Gentle Leader Easy Walk Harnesses. They wear these when we’re driving so we can fasten them in to prevent them from bouncing around the vehicle like crazy dogs, covering all the windows with dog snot and/or bounding out the second the door is opened.

We’re not really crazy about the Gentle Leader harnesses and reverted to using CeCe’s old harness on Belle. But then, last week, it mysteriously broke. So this past weekend, Belle wore the Gentle Leader harness again.

Here’s what it looked like when we got home…

That’s when we realized the old harness had not “broken.” All this time we thought Belle was just being a good little passenger, she’d been quietly working away at gnawing through the harness. That was apparently her way of saying, “I don’t like this stinking harness.” (Meg, on the other hand, would’ve said, “I don’t like this f@*#ing harness.”)

Yes, it took a while to get to the point of this post. But you had to have the whole picture. Besides, through poking fun at Hubby I have created a public admission to being a disorganized mess.

That Hubby of mine is very patient when it comes to my foibles. A lesser man would have just given up and divorced me by now!

UPDATE on yesterday’s post… Klondike, my grand-dog, was the culprit. I suspected as much. He spent the day here with Amy, who was sick. She called today to fess up and apologize. But, like I told her, the point I was trying to make was not that the poop was left in my yard. I mean, I wasn’t thrilled, especially after sticking my finger in it, but that’s not the moral of my post. The moral was supposed to be, don’t let stupid stuff like poop get you all worked up. There are more important things in life, like your sick spouse, on which you should focus.