ANDY AND I TRY TO AVOID FIGHTS, sometimes by lying to each other. When he asks, “Am I going bald here?” I say, “What?! Please. You look so much like Bradley Cooper it’s uncanny.”
Or when I say, “Wow, that Kate Beckinsale sure is hot,” he says, “That dog? You’re way prettier.” He’s so convincing that in the end I feel a little sorry for Kate. She seems like a nice girl, if only she weren’t so ugly.
Despite our commitment to dishonesty, we still disagree sometimes. Below is a list of our main sticking points:
How to discipline the computer
Because I live with a computer genius, I know that when the computer is acting up, I’m supposed to turn it off and then on again, but Andy and I disagree on how to do this. He wants to go directly to clicking restart. I think that’s like sending your kid to his room but then saying, “It’s OK! You can come out now!” before you even shut the door. It may solve the immediate problem, but it’ll only lead to disobedience later.
I think we should turn off the computer, wait an appropriate amount of time until it’s learned its lesson, and then turn it on again. This is partly because I don’t know how to do it Andy’s way, but more because I’m serious about computer discipline.
Does my way work? We’ll never know. Andy’s always going soft on our laptop and undermining my authority.
Whether to watch the six-hour “Pride and Prejudice” miniseries or Andy’s full collection of “Star Trek” movies
Actually, we never fight about this. We have two young children. We’d never even make it to the part where Mr. Darcy, played by Colin Firth, jumps into the lake for a swim, emerging with his wet shirt sticking to his manly chest. But, Andy, if you’re reading this, you know I’m not really excited about that part. Whenever I see it, all I can think is, couldn’t they possibly have cast someone better-looking for this role?
The mess on the countertop
Andy tries hard to be neater because his cleanliness level dips below mine, and I try to be accepting of his messes because I want to think of myself as laid-back and just generally awesome. Also, in my saner moments, I realize that it doesn’t really matter that the counter is messy.
So days pass and the counter is littered with junk, and I don’t say anything because I’m as cool as a cucumber. But, for the record, it’s not just a mess of papers. It’s papers, batteries, iPads, extension cords, modems, mouse pads and robots that have built themselves out of the technological rubble and are learning our language and planning a hostile takeover. Andy tries to clean small patches of it because he’s considerate, and I want to say something about it but don’t because I’m the kind of person who is totally OK with messy countertops.
But then we’ll have one of those days when Colin and Annabelle are running and screaming in the house, emitting enough energy to power three Hummers, and I yell, “Gaa! I can’t stand it! I haven’t seen the top of the counter in months!” This in no way solves the actual problem (i.e., the Hummer children) but it does result in a clean counter for approximately 4 hours before the robots begin to rebuild themselves.
That’s really our main fight. We have it maybe every six months. We don’t need therapy because our current strategy of ignoring it until I crack and yell and Andy quietly cleans the counter seems to work really well for us.
Oh, and we also fight about who’s more painful to look at, that ghastly Kate Beckinsale or Quasimodo Colin Firth. We wonder how they still get movie roles, but then we agree that it must be that someone in Hollywood feels sorry for their ugly selves.
Kirstin Odegaard runs the Benicia Tutoring Center. Read and comment on her writings at www.kodegaard.com.
Sharing is caring!
