Oooh...and one more thing!

Two days have gone by…and we’re already at the “oooh…and one more thing!” phase as the wifey walks out the front door to her jobby job. Oh how evil the flip-side of the coin is. There’s a part of me that thinks that after dropping an “oooh…and one more thing!” list on me, the wifey jumps in the car, cranks the radio, and bee bops her fine ass to work knowing I’m at home throwing stuff animals at my son’s imaginary friends, punching pillows, kicking cushions, and wasting valuable time that could be spent taking care of the “simple activities we’d talked about this morning.”

Wifey: “Hey, so are you picking up the kids today from school?”

Me: “Uh..yeah, I can…but I’m supposed to be making calls, and working on getting a job right?”

Wifey: “Yes dear, but I just thought you….oh, just forget it, I’ll do it.”

Me: “No…I want to do it, I just don’t want it to become this….”

Wifey: “Oooh …and one more thing, could you clean the cat litter box? I just walked down in the basement and it smells like your dirty underwear down there.”

Me: “My dirty underwear is down there…”

Wifey: “Oooh….and one more thing, please don’t spend any money, we really need to be careful.”

Me: “We needed milk…and you said, ‘oooh…and one more thing, could you get some hummus’ remember….!’”

Wifey: “Yeah… I remember, but do you really need all that beer!?”

Me: “Yes!!! Yes I do!!! Do you really need all that..”

Wifey: “Oooh…..and one more thing …can you please just wash one load of laundry…?”

She was a stay-at-home-mom for almost a year. I feel like such an ass cause I can count on my hands, and five of my friends’ hands, how many times I dropped the “oohhh” bomb on her before bolting out the door with the confident feeling that when I got home, the children would be dressed in their dinner clothes, smiling, pulling chairs out for me, asking me how my day was while dinner was wafting through the air, and birds were grasping my top coat and hat to be put away.

And now the shoe is on….yes…the wifey’s foot. And, she doesn’t mean it maliciously. At least I don’t think. I like to think she has no clue that she’s pulling the payback page right out of the book and shoving it up my ass. I like to think she’s giving me payback, without even knowing it! But, that would just be my ignorance showing again.  

Enough with the Candy!

Candy, candy, contstant candy…

In the morning, “Daddy can I have a piece of candy if I eat ALL my cereal?”

And that’s followed by the sincere, but to-the-point explanation of why the candy cannot be taken from the bowl unless it’s following a lunch or dinner. And since the majority of lunches are at school, and we don’t want to be bothered at work from the principal claiming our children have climbed the flagpole 32 times in 5 minutes and are hitting up bums for pieces of chocolate and have the shakes…we reserve the right to dish out 2 pieces of candy following a delicious, nutritious dinner made with love by the wifey or I.

But…they…just…don’t….fucking…..get…..it…..

 So, we continue to deal with the fighting.

Yesterday I’m upstairs trying to iron my clothes cause it’s 2009 and I can’t rightfully say to my wife: “Woman….my work clothes have a wrinkle. Get in there and slap some heat on em!!” And I’m watching the Today Show cause …yeah, I watch the Today Show!!!... and I hear all holy hell breaking lose downstairs.

“But IIIIII should get a piece mommy,” this shrill little girly voice bounces its way upstairs pounding my ears and bringing me to my knees.

“I didn’t give him any candy Macy!!!” Now I know this voice well. This is the same voice that says things to me like:

“I asked you twice to please wash the dishes, yet you made the decision to….”

And – “Why is all this CLEAN laundry on the bedroom floor. You could have folded it with the time it took you to toss it on the floor.”

And – “Oh really? REALLY? I look ‘fine’ in this outfit? Not hot…or hawt…or sexy…or MILFy…but ‘fine?’ That’s what this has come to?!’”

So, fearing for my children’s lives, I decide to get involved. So with towel wrapped around my waste, shaving cream in my face, I bust all up in the argument.

“Hey – hey-HEY!!!!! What’s going on?!!”

Now I’ve been trying like hell for over a decade to break this woman…this saint…this goddess I call my wifey. And not even for a damn second have I seen the underside of that thick-ass shell she’s encrusted in that keeps us all shivering at night. But my kids…who have collectively been alive less than the number of years the wifey and I have been married…managed to do it.

Like a freakin 4-year-old…the wifey turns to me, holding an empty candy package and says, “Grayson picked up this old empty candy wrapper and Macy saw him holding it and thought I gave him candy, but I didn’t……I really didn’t and now everyone’s yelling at ME and I don’t like it and I didn’t do ANYTHING!!!”

Most people would have shat themselves…a few would have slowly sat down on the steps and started crying. If I was dressed, I would have said nothing and headed off to the train a few minutes early. But I manned up. I took control. I grabbed my virtual crown, threw that bitch on my head, put on the “look out cause the wrath of hell is coming down on your now” look on my face and I said, “The candy shall be thrown……AWAY!!!!”

And holy mother of shit did that unleash tears…. Even I had to bite my lip from crying at what a dick I’d become.

After pleading and negotiating, and reconfiguring the written contract originally drawn-up…we came to a conclusion. Candy will be given when the crying becomes too much, the parents can’t take anymore, and it’s the only thing that will shut everyone the fuck up.

After everything was signed, heads were in bead, snores were heard throughout sleepy land…I crept out to the ally with an evil grin on my face and threw everything but 12 pieces of candy away. Standing in the ally with my SpongeBob undies and undershirt with armpit holes I realized I’ve become that guy that hates candy, and therefore children, and therefore Halloween, and therefore all the awesomeness that comes with it. So I snatched the candy back out…ran inside…threw it back in their bowls and righted what was wronged.

I slept peacefull last night….but for shit-sake, don’t tell the wifey I accidentally dropped her favorite Twizzlers in our neighbor’s dog’s……