Reason Number 101

When I was still a young and innocent freckled face girl, I dreamed of my true love who would come for me, sweep my off my feet, buy me sparkling jewels, write me beautiful poetry and whisper sweet nothing to me for the rest of my life.

Now I would settle for a man who can shut the fuck up long enough for me to read one page of a novel or watch five minutes of a Seinfeld rerun.

If you are new to my story, I refer to my husband as SCM and if you stick around a while, you will soon find out why.

However, reason number one hundred and one is about SCM’s need to comment on every fucking thing as he feels it, sees it or thinks about it.

Every fucking thing.

A familiar actor on a commercial will result in a fifteen minute speech on every movie said actor has starred in, every show of which he guest starred, every cameo appearance for the last twenty years and if he prefers the stall to the urinal.

Keep in mind this actor was familiar to him. I personally not only have never seen him before in my life, I didn’t ask and I didn't care.

But that makes no difference to SCM.

By now one would think the disgusted look and exasperate sigh that I shoot in his direction would discourage him for continuing. One might think that if one didn’t know my husband. When he is on a role, what he is saying is so darn important that he convinces himself that I will be ever so grateful for the information if I would just be patient and allow him to get to the end of his tale.

I don’t even pretend to pay attention anymore. Politeness for this behavior ended in about year two of our marriage. I don’t look at him, comment upon what he says or offer any facial acknowledgements whatsoever. I have tried to shush him in the past but I learned that all that does is get him off on a tangent as to why he feels the need to tell the story before he tells the actual story thus increasing the time I have to tune him out to catch Kramer’s one liner.

As if this isn’t bad enough, SCM has a problem understanding the concept of a book. When someone’s face is in front of several hundred sheets of bound paper, they are usually engrossed in something either educational or amusing. Now you and I friends, being hopefully normal people, understand this. Not my husband. If I am reading, I am doing nothing and am totally free and available for conversation.

It is quite obvious that I must be bored and in need of some entertainment. Now what could be more entertaining then to listen to one of the hundreds of stories I have already heard a dozen times?

A reasonable and rational person, when told they have already shared a particular story, will not feel the need to tell it again with every detail expanded upon.

Reasonable is the key word here.

Tuning him out while staring mindlessly at a big screen TV is a lot easier than tuning him when my brain is trying to be fully aware of what I am reading. After reading the same sentence twelve or thirteen times, I usually give up, throw the book down and ask him to let me know when he is done.

Am I a bitch?

Fuck yeah.

What’s a gal to do when hints do not work and downright rudeness doesn’t either?

A large blunt instrument to his head comes to mind.