There have been so many, oh so very many, abysmally stupid arguments I have fallen into with the man I consider the love of my life, the father of my children. Herewith, for your amusement, the two stupidest arguments we've had recently:
I. The Fishnets Argument: A ten year-old we know wore a micro-miniskirt and fishnet stockings to an event we attended. The Sober Husband and I argued over whether a micro-miniskirt (the shortness of this skirt cannot be exaggerated) and fishnets are sexy clothing.
Sample dialogue:
Sober Husband (snidely): Maybe it's just you with the dirty mind, who is reading into it.
Me (heatedly): I'd be happy to drive you down to the Tenderloin and show you a ton of whores wearing that same outfit on the job!
Sober Husband (loftily): What if I could tell you that dressing like that was the very best way of defying authority? Don't you want children to question authority?
Me (becoming incoherent): As a feminist, I'm really troubled by a prepubescent wearing sexualized clothing [raising my voice to drown out repeated accusation that it is only me, with my dirty mind, who sees a micro mini over fishnets as sexual] which is likely to put a little girl in situations she's not prepared to handle!
This argument droned on and on, with neither combatant willing to back down. I am still incredulous that an intelligent man, a man with a Ph.D for God's sakes, would argue so hard that fishnets and a crotchskimmer are fine, admirable clothing for a ten year-old, particularly since he's arguing with the woman who doles out the fellatio and the food, but there you have it. Outcome: Unsettled.
II. The Relative Intelligence of Parrots: An evergreen, this one never dies completely. Whose parrot is smarter: the Sober Husband's, the crabby twelve year-old Amazon parrot, or mine, the sweet, little one year-old African Grey? Sample dialogue:
Sober Husband (snidely): Your bird is dumb. Mine can talk.
Me (in a feisty manner): Yeah, well, my bird can find her way upstairs! Your bird can't go upstairs alone!
Iris uber Alles (siding with her mother): That's because his bird is too fat! It's too fat to get up the stairs!
Sidenote: As I was composing this piece, I asked the Sober Husband if he could give me some examples of stupid arguments we have, and he said, "How to load the dishwasher." I gave him a look. "That's not a stupid argument; you just won't do it right!" Readers, I submit to you: the man won't follow the simple directives that Tupperware always goes on the top rack, and the non-stick pans are hand-wash only. That's not an argument worth debating; it's someone who refuses to remember two simple rules and damages valuable dishes in his carelessness.
On the brighter side, during the one millionth and one iteration of the Your Parrot Is Dumber argument, the Sober Husband recently had a generous moment and allowed, "Maybe they're both dumb. Maybe my parrot is dumb, too." Outcome: a temporary tie.
9 comments:
I understand how to preserve nonstick surfaces on cookware. We simply have one pan that has metal plating, which my wife mistakes for a nonstick surface.
Our tupperware is demonstrably unharmed by washing on the lower rack.
Our principle disagreement is about how densely the dishes should be packed. I sometimes allow dishes to touch, in the interest of greater dish density. My wife feels that dishes need to be physically isolated.
There have been occasions of small, nonstick frying pans being in the dishwasher (and not the one you mean, which is appropriate for the dishwasher).
The spacing is because several times I have opened the dishwasher -- when I didn't load it -- to find broken glasses. If dishes are loaded so that the force of the water jets makes them strike each other repeatedly, the less hardy ones will break. That bothers me more than you. I only have 1 left of a set of six really gorgeous faux tortoiseshell tall glasses.
And I have thrown away some plastic, tupperwareish containers after the lids no longer could be put on the bottoms... due to improper dishwashing.
If one takes a survival-of-the-fittest-dishes approach, then I supposed there is no need for rules. Pile it all in, wherever, and let the best dishes survive (but not my pretty glasses).
Ok, ummm... Crotchskimmer, fellatio, food. Wait -- What were we talking about? I've completely lost track.
BTW, I'm so happy you've continued this argument in the comments. It makes me look so well-adjusted!
But even though I'm quite anal and have some OCD tendencies about the dishwasher, I have to side with Mr. Kast. Glasses that break in the dishwasher only make your overall population of glassware stronger. That's a good thing.
And for Jebus' sake, why are you throwing out tupperware? You bring it to the tupper-wench and exchange it. I buy the rattiest looking tupper-crap at garage sales and routinely exchange it.
I just realized your last paragraph was kind of my argument about strengthening your glass spolpulation. Oh well. After the mention of crotchskimmers, fellatio and food, I guess the blood hadn't gotten back to my brain.
http://www.uniquescoop.com/2010/06/kitties-rescued-by-us-marine-soldiers.html
I saw that, Anonymous, I did, and it gave my evil old black heart a warm glow. There is nothing like seeing a combat hardened soldier holding a little kitten to his face.
The fishnets argument jarred some recent recollections and observations revolving around my older daughter's dance competitions.
Many of the routines at my daughter's dance school this year involved costumes that included fishnets.
I know this only because I had to go to the mandatory meeting where the dance school owner/instructor went down the list of every routine's costume harping on the mandatory components, how they were to be worn, and what to do to avoid wardrobe malfunctions.
I have to say that it raised my eyebrow, but overall the costumes weren't suggestive. So I guess there are ways to wear fishnets without looking unseemly.
On a tangential note, it seemed like there was a mini-craze over Rocky Horror at the dance competitions. I think I saw two or three renditions of the "Time Warp", including one of them being a Chipmunk recording. One of the routines used an unedited recording, complete with references to "pelvic thrust", which caused me to cringe just a little.
Eating utensils, handles up or down?
I'm just not into fishnet stockings for prepubescents. If my the place where I pay through the nose for Lola to prance around required me to get them for Lola for her dance recital, I'd throw a hopefully somewhat dignified hissy fit.
I'm not that conservative a mother. I've died Iris's hair both blonde and red before she got to the 3d grade, for God's sake! I'm all about fun and funkiness, but I don't want my children sexualized at an early age, and I do not want them dressing in a sexualized manner at an innocent age. Plenty of time for that later...
And utensils: handles up. That is because I heard (possible urban legend alert) about a little girl who fell down and got impaled on a knife in the dishwasher, and so we got in the habit of loading everything handles up.
DH, I'm in for the handles up, but for different reasons. Why would you grab the sharp ends of knives and the part of the utensils that go in your mouth? If they didn't come clean maybe (overloading problem?) I could see it.
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