Pffttt. We have only been married 14 years, and last night I swear, I almost smothered him in his sleep.
DrGerbil has a freaking cold, and he does the creepy lipsmacky thing that makes a sparkly kind of sound and I'm like EITHER CLOSE YOUR MOUTH OR OPEN IT BUT STOP OPENING AND CLOSING IT AND MAKING THAT SPARKLY CREEPY SOUND DAMMIT!!
Now I know why my Mom refuses to join my Dad in retirement even though her job is super stressful.
@Rooo sez BISH PLZ: He loves the Chapstick. Not the nice friuty kind, that awful original scent which I hate. Then he kisses me goodnight with it on and then I smell like it, too.
Last night I went to bed pissed at my fiance and this morning left him a note telling him to clean the kitchen. If this is our 20s, what the hell are our golden years going to look like?
Back when my aspiration was to be in a relationship 4eva and have no real existence of my own, I was still irritated as fuck when my boyfriend would put out his fucking Transfuckingformers as if they were perfectly normal fucking tchotchkes and then fucking complain about my fucking judging him for fucking "liking weird things."
@PilgrimSoul: My sister is married to a man who is 46 and has a ROOM full of James Bond figures and posters. Like the 40 year old virgin. It is strange, but it is who he is.
@PilgrimSoul: hey, if he puts up with my scary glow in the dark religious iconography collection, I can allow our glass cabinet to be filled with Pez dispensers.
Getting taken for granted - and taking your partner for granted - is all-too-easy once a relationship gets any sort of longevity. Me and mine have gotten into the habit of saying "thank you" for EVERYTHING - doing dishes, making a cup of tea, holding a door. Sounds simple but you would not believe how much nicer the home atmosphere is for it. No one feels taken for granted, doing little things for one another never feels like a burden... two little words people, they work.
@Cocotte: totally. Personally I require basically a standing ovation from my partner just for doing "my" chores like washing the dishes or taking out the trash. I always demand that he comes over and admires my handiwork and makes a big deal over what a good job I did. I am a baby, yes, but it helps.
My husband and I made a deal: if he picks his socks off the floor, I will make our chihuahua will sleep in its kennel. Needless to say, the pup has stayed in the bed. I don't bug him about it and he can't complain when his toes get licked in the middle of the night.
@JSouth: Ugh, I don't understand why men can't pick up after themselves. How did his socks even get ON the floor?! When I take my socks off I throw them in the hamper. I actually stand by the hamper as I take them off and then they go FROM my feet TO my hands INTO the hamper.
Interesting that the article is titled "Women more irritable in marriage than men". Couldn't it possibly be, oh wise and prescient Telegraph, that "Men more IRRITATING in marriage than women"?
@RedVelvetCake: Yep, this is wrong. Science had proved it. The sexes talk equally, or men have a slight edge. There are tons of studies on it, and books, and so on.
I like to think I'll some day be one member of a couple that's held together by mutual irritation. Every time that vision for my future goes a little fuzzy, I just re-watch The Thin Man or any Nick & Nora Charles vehicle, and I feel much better.
@BlondeGrlz is having a BlondeBoyz!: That's funny. I missed it when they were born too. Mr. Badmutha just looked at me like I was an idiot when I told him what I felt about the babies. I haz the true love too.
Am I the only one who got the 'Your mother's changed a lot over the years/Your father's not the man I married' talk around the time their parents turned 50?
@Plum-Pie: I think it's actually been the opposite with my parents. They had a rough time starting out (they got married very young), and they even separated for a few months. But, now that they are both in their 50s, they realize they couldn't live without each other (especially my dad without my mom)
@Plum-Pie: No, my parents are way too complacent/unchanging through time for that. My dad has one beer and starts saying, "your mother is as beautiful as the day I met her" and trying to slap her ass with a dishtowel. Then she says, "yeah and your father is as drunk as he was then."
@Plum-Pie: I didn't b/c my Dad died at 51. But what do people expect? I mean, that you turn 21 and never change again? Maybe if you were a robot! People change over time, and they either grow together or they grow apart. My BIL and SIL are splitting up after 12 years. She just doesn't love him any more.
@Plum-Pie: No, I got it much earlier because they divorced in their early 30's. Not that any of them has stopped complaining about the other. :/
In some aspects, I have really immature parents, especially my dad. Dude's a cautionary tale of what happens when you spoil the male firstborn in a Hispanic family.
@Plum-Pie: my parents get annoyed with each other sometimes but they still get all kissy and smoochy. I think they beat the odds somehow because they got married way early (mom was 20, dad 23) but still really love each other. maybe when they retire and have to spend all their time together something will happen.
@Plum-Pie: I hasten to add my parents are totally devoted to eachother, they've been together at least 35 years. I just got a full and frank rundown of all their little gripes when I was about 16, which i really could have done without.
This makes me sad. My grandfather died a week ago and he and my grandmother were married for 62 years. They definitely had their ups and downs, but they really did love each other very much. I miss him so much :(
My grandmother abandons my grandfather a couple of times a year to "visit family" (i.e. get drunk on the beach with her sisters and zip around Rio in a rented convertible)partly to give him consistent reminders that life w/o her would be a morass of confusion & boredom. He never takes her for granted.
@Plum-Pie: Why not? She's coached many a young woman in the ways of awesome. The luckiest thing that ever happened to me was when I was 12, & my aunt pointed at my grandma & said,"She's going to talk to you about life and men now. Do what she says. She knows how to handle her business".
They also report being annoyed that the mailman delivers mail late, that they can't find low sodium tinned pumpkin, and that their granddaughter is living in sin with her Mexican boyfriend.
@J.D.Regent: Shocking new study reveals that you don't call your grandparents enough. Study also wants to know if you've lost weight, and when is that nice boy going to make an honest woman out of you?
@lalaland13: ha! I had my ob/gyn, who went to med-school with my grandma, scold me because I was not calling her enough. But when this is the dude that got you out of your mom's belleh, you just say 'yes Vachier, I will make an effort to call abuela more often'. :/
So I have to call abuela, doctor's order. Old people are hilarious sometimes.
duh. if you live with anybody for a few years, you're gonna get aggravated by certain things they do. i get aggravated with myself for the things that i do!
anyway the study ends by noting that these couples are still happy to be with each other, which is more optimistic than one's led to believe by the headline.
12/19/08
DrGerbil has a freaking cold, and he does the creepy lipsmacky thing that makes a sparkly kind of sound and I'm like EITHER CLOSE YOUR MOUTH OR OPEN IT BUT STOP OPENING AND CLOSING IT AND MAKING THAT SPARKLY CREEPY SOUND DAMMIT!!
Now I know why my Mom refuses to join my Dad in retirement even though her job is super stressful.
12/19/08
The smakking, they stopz it. True story.
12/19/08
See what I mean? HE IRRITATES ME.
12/19/08
12/19/08
and we were 21.
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
Not even something you could understand, like Vader heads.
No. Boba Fett models.
And this is happening NOW.
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
my boy and I slip into weird accents and sometimes baby talk. But we're only secretly sickening!
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
Dining table... socks underneath chair
bed... socks ON HIS NIGHTSTAND, FOUR FEET FROM LAUNDRY HAMPER.
12/19/08
Oh, codswollop.
12/19/08
That's one theory.
The other one is: maybe men just don't complain as much because they talk less in general. Hmmm....
12/19/08
Statistically, they actually don't.
The nagging old bird angle is always a handy one, eh Telegraph!
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
Me: You know, once this baby comes out I'm going to kind of miss feeling him move around in there.
Mr. BGZ: Well I could always kick you in the stomach and random intervals if that would help.
True love, I haz it.
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
In some aspects, I have really immature parents, especially my dad. Dude's a cautionary tale of what happens when you spoil the male firstborn in a Hispanic family.
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
So I have to call abuela, doctor's order. Old people are hilarious sometimes.
12/19/08
Tinned PUMPKIN? We not have such delicacies in my country.
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
12/19/08
anyway the study ends by noting that these couples are still happy to be with each other, which is more optimistic than one's led to believe by the headline.