Remember The Nose War?
Well, now it’s a fork.
There’s a fork on the bookcase by the front door, and it’s been there for at least a week. Maybe two weeks. My teenager asked me about it, without implying that he might be willing to take it back to the kitchen. I told him that I didn’t know what it was doing on the bookcase, but I wasn’t going to move it, either. He understood.
Now it has taken the place of The Nose. My husband has obviously seen the fork, since nothing escapes his eagle eye (especially things that are kitchen-related.)
We’ll see what happens.
Do any of you play these childish games with your partner? If not, you’re really missing out on the true essence of marriage.
My husband constantly moves a trivet in the kitchen and I move it back. Neither of us speak about it, but it happens almost daily. I actually think it looks better where he leaves it, even if it is a little impractical on top of the hob! I can’t remember how it started now!
Years back he was in the habit of rearranging the furniture in our lounge when I was in bed! Sofas, tables and nic-naks would never be in the same place the next morning. It was disorientating, thankfully he’s stopped it now, but not before I threatened to leave!
So far this is one of my favorite posts.
A wonderful fun and games indeed…I’m getting all nostalgic and I may start to think that I miss my marriages. My second husband played the game “where is xxx” – insert: my shirt, my socks, my shaving kit, the dog’s leash, the hammer, the book I’m reading, just about anything.
We lived in a small one bedroom apartment, how difficult it was to remember where things are? After 2 years, location of things in kitchen cupboards was still a total mystery to him. One day I asked “Do you think that I have a honing device for things in the uterus”? He thought it was very funny, while I was absolutely exasperated.
I am SO anal-retentive about the cleanliness and order of my house, I would freak right the fuck on out if I found a fork for days on end on a bookcase at the front door. I need a hobby.
I do that with toilet paper. I’ll leave toilet paper sitting above the holder, instead of putting it on the holder, to see if my bf will ever do it, but then he doesn’t and I get annoyed and do it myself. I have no restraint to wait for days like you!
So whatever happened to the nose? Did he notice? Pick it up?
My ex was a very good looking, charismatic, expressive, musician, but I have never met nor loved (lesson learned) anyone with his propensity for avoiding confrontation. He also had a slight obsessive compulsive tendency to perfectly align dirty dishes before washing them. Not a big deal, the obsessive behaviour seemed to manifest itself only at the kitchen sink. I am grateful he knew where sink was and was prepared to use it. When he was distracted I would subtly skew his perfect dish lines. Quickly, unconsciously he would return them into place, a slight farrow in his brow the only hint of annoyance.I think his subtle but distinct reaction Is why i enjoyed doing it. It reminded and assured me that even when my man was all clammed shut I had managed to affect him. When there was a million words unsaid between us, this made me smile.
The nose and the fork are far more fun than the psychological “war” I’ve been having with my husband. Not to mention, I think our war is one-sided. I notice lots of things that shouldn’t be where they are and refuse to move/clean them up just to see how long it will go. There was a finger nail clipping (TOTALLY from my husband who clips his nails in the bathroom, yuck) on our bathroom sink for about a month. I was actually too mortified by it to clean it up until one day, enough was enough. I still haven’t mentioned it to him. But it has really been bothering me, even after the fact. After seeing this in writing, it’s a good thing I’m going to a therapist. Ha.
I love this game! My husband and I don’t play it quite as intensely (we usually leave the object there for 2 days before our willpower dissolves and we return it to its original spot), but we live with a roommate that will leave the strangest stuff EVERYWHERE.
He took spaghetti out of a pot with those big spoons and LEFT IT IN MY POTATO BOWL. There was tomato sauce on my potatoes! I wanted to leave it there to see if he would notice it (he never does), but I was too grossed out.
We just gave him one of our bathroom scales, and we were trying it out in the kitchen. For someone who was really excited to own a scale, he left it in the kitchen. It’s right over the threshold and we are leaving it there. We don’t care if anyone trips over it. He’s GOT to notice it eventually.
My husband loves to come into my bathroom and tweek things so they are in the order that he thinks they should be. I love to go into the room after him and move everything just a little. We thrive on these little power struggles.
This makes me laugh out loud.
I think I would be the perpetrator in this situation. MrB has probably left stuff out wondering when I’m going to move it, and I doubt I ever come through.
I love this post so much! I used to have a toilet roll experiment on my partner – ie how many finished toilet rolls would it take for him to notice and move some. We got to 10 and I cracked and recycled them all.
I always think of these activities as experiments, like I’m doing Real Science and as though one day I’ll make a spreadsheet about it…
ellio100 – it IS science! Do the spreadsheet!
I’ve done this test on my children many times. Nobody ever moves/picks up anything. If I went on strike we’d all be buried alive in our own filth and then die a slow, suffocating death.
Sheri – Oh no, you can’t play this with kids, especially teenagers. Then it’s just masochism.
@sharnek I do something very similar with a packet of those individual flossers. I move them to where they should belong, he moves them back. Daily. LOL
@Cricket9 – my dad was the same way. He actually attributed my mum’s remarkable knowledge of exactly where everything was to her uterus and assumed that I, having a uterus, should have the same ability.
Alicia, yes, women are born with the ability of remembering where things are and locating them; it’s not because we clean and organize and put things in place (I have to admit that my standards on putting things in place slipped a lot since I live alone…), it’s because of the anatomical differences!
How long can you play this game until you totally resent the other person? I’ve learned that it takes me about a month. My former roommate was the worst. She’d often cook and leave messes on the stove. At most I boil water, so I really didn’t feel it was my responsibility to clean up after her. Well, eventually I had company over, and the stains and splatters were too embarrassing to leave. Another mind boggling thing she would do is not put her dirty dishes in the dishwasher. She insisted on leaving all of her crusty dishes and cookware in the sink with the thought that she’d just wash them herself. She had this weird ass luddite attitude when it came to the dishwasher. Again, after nearly a month, I’d just load them into the damn machine myself.
I guess this is why I’m perpetually single. But, I do have to say that while living with my emotionally devoid ex-bf, we actually got along in the tidy department. That was about it though.
I was once at the house from some very sloppy friends and, after peering at this strange lump under a chair for some time, said to the teenage son, “David, what IS that under that chair?”
He bent down, picked it up, said “It’s a rotting potato.” And PUT IT BACK.
I freaked out.
My husband used to enjoy a midnight snack and would eat everything in the fridge and then put all the bowls and plates BACK.
He assured me it was to help me, so I knew what we were out of and I could make or buy some more.
my sister and i had an incident with a knife in the shower. it was left there for about 6 months… my boyfriend was the one who finally moved it. neither of us remembered how the knife got in the shower, but we both refused to move it.
I had an incident in the shower once, but that wasn’t it.
@Andra
Apparently I did something similar to your husband when I was younger. I would eat apples in the middle of the night and then put the core back in the fridge. I can’t remember anything from that age but I would like to know why I thought that was a good idea.
Yes!!! That happens in my house quite regularly. Currently there is a black sock on my living room floor and i have just been cleanin around it. For three days. I am almost positive nobody has noticed.
Well I’m not Mr. Sister, but I know him well and actually feel I can speak for him on some matters, like this one. What you can’t see from the picture and certainly not from the narrative is that this object ceased to be a fork a while ago. It is completely flat. The Mr. figures a car ran over it because…it was on the street in front of their house for a week or two before somebody brought it in the house and left it where the picture was taken. So it’s not a “hey why doesn’t somebody take this back to the kitchen and wash it so we can eat with it” deal-not that that wouldn’t be a struggle as well-its more of a “hey somebody bothered to fetch this from the street in front of the house where it had been flattened and so they must have had a reason to do it, and when they’re ready I guess they’ll move it and do whatever inspired them to rescue it in the first place” deals. It’s always good to get the whole story, maybe not as fun, but a more complete picture. Anyway if the Mr. tells me the fork-whisperer comes clean, I’ll let you know
The sex difference manifests itself with laundry, too. My clothes always seem to make it IN the hamper, and his end their travels on top or beside it. I leave them there for awhile as I enjoy my supremacy snit, but always seem to be the one who finally picks them up. I guess he figures that his clothes eventually make it inside by osmosis.
Recently Mr That’s Not My Age pointed out a selection of my shoes in the bathroom. There were about five pairs around the toilet that I really hadn’t noticed. I’ve developed a habit of rushing in from work, going to the loo , simultaneously removing my shoes and just leaving them there. That Is My Age.
Update?
Kathleen, I had a similar problem. And bloody annoying it was too.
I solved the problem by removing the husband. Worked a treat.
I’ll move the damn fork myself if that will get you to post again.
Hahaha @ Joan
I’m on a sock protest. I’m picking up, washing, hanging out, bringing in and putting in the hotpress, then folding and putting away everything but socks.
As this currently only affects the 1. Teenage Male Nephew and 2. Husband of the house it has yet to be noticed or remarked upon.
Okay it is not knocking down a wall in East Berlin or shaking keys in Wenceslas Square but it makes me feel better. xx
Aha ha haa!! Love you sis!!!
It’s broken CD cases in this household. They’re everywhere, and my husband hoards them for whatever reason. There’s also a totally useless tiny plastic rubix cube that followed us from the last apartment and now sits on a shelf in our living room. I could’ve sworn I threw it out, but somehow it’s now being showcased in our living room. Additionally, there is a jar in our bedroom that is full of miscellaneous trash — wax renderings of fingertips, string, empty 50 cent machine eggs, broken glasses, garment tags, old cell phone chargers … I dump it out all the time, but it fills up again instantaneously.
Is it just me or do most of your fans in the comment section seem a trifle British of late? Just sayin’