Tag Archives: marriage

Please don’t tell my husband.

July 17, 2019 Rivergirl 30 Comments

At one time or another my husband has collected all of the following:

Bottles, playing cards, coins, rusty farm implements, stamps, egg coddlers, antique mitre saws, Life magazines, Coca Cola memorabilia, post cards, baseball bats, radios, toy cars, fishing lures, vintage board games, alabaster eggs, crackle glass, razors, old telephones, fire extinguishers, glass oil jugs, wooden hangers, milk crates, Fenton, mason jars, books, Tinker Toys, sleds, bean pots, grain scales, wooden skis, haying forks, lamp fixtures, cigar boxes, pencil sharpeners, apple peelers, grinding wheels, cast iron skillets, flour sifters, fishing rods, tennis rackets, flashlights and egg beaters.

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And no, I’m not exaggerating.

The sad part is, that’s probably not the entire list… but I’m cringing just thinking about it and had to stop. Or slaughter him in his sleep, and who needs that mess on a weeknight.

Kidding!

I think…

For the past 35 years if someone was selling it? He was buying it. And as soon as he had one? He wanted more. To which my response was always..

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We currently have an apple press, a wooden washing machine, a butter smoothing table, a potato planter and two 5 foot tall wagon wheel frames in our barn.

Why?

My answer is –

His answer is –

So when I read there’s now a market for old Kool Aid packets, and they’re selling for hundreds of dollars a piece?

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It’s true.

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It’s beyond ridiculous.

And if any of you tell my husband?

I will hunt you down and rip your tongue out through your nose.

P.S….

If the late 80’s and early 90’s are vintage…

What the hell am I?

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Because when Rustoleum says red? They mean red.

July 13, 2019 Rivergirl 46 Comments

Every few years it’s time to repaint the bulkhead doors.

They’re metal and tend to see a lot of abuse.

Rain, snow, and baking sun all take their toll… and since the husband disappears every time the paint brushes come out?

The job falls to me.

I usually go out with some sandpaper to smooth and remove the flakes… but this spring the husband bought an old sander at a yard sale. Old.. with a capital O.

So he tossed it at me and said it would be much easier than my sandpaper.

From the look of the cord it was from the 1950’s…. and I think that was the poundage as well because just lifting it hurt my wrist. So when he came back to check my progress? I was using the sandpaper again.

Which… because he’s a man and can never be wrong… made him determined to prove his $5 purchase was worth while.

He got no argument from me.

I stood back, nodded sagely and mumbled yes dear, that’s so much easier dear, at appropriate intervals.

Momma didn’t raise no fool.

He sanded that baby from top to bottom.

Inside and out… even though I rarely paint the interior.

BTW, if you search Google images for power sander memes?

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Anyway… when we moved into this house, the doors were painted a barn red so that’s what I’ve always repainted them.

Until this year, when I couldn’t find my usual brand of metal paint in barn red and went with Rustoleum’s Regal Red.

It was a bad idea.

Very bad.

Really, really bad.

Because when Rustoleum says red?

They mean red!

Fire engine red.

Candy apple red.

Holy Crap that’s red… RED!

It’s positively blinding.

On the bright side, the doors do now match my hanging geranium.

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So I got excited.

July 3, 2019 Rivergirl 31 Comments

No, not that kind of excited.

Although now that I think about Chris… well, never mind.

I got excited because at 11:00am last Saturday the husband told me he was going to clean out the barn and set up a small yard sale.

My husband was going to get rid of his crap?

I was happy!

I was thrilled!

Hell, I admit it.

I was positively orgasmic.

I looked out the window and saw him sell something to a biker.

Yay!

All the useless Harley knick knacks and paraphernalia…. gone!

All those extra Kawasaki parts and accessories…. gone!

And then I looked out the window again.

And saw my late mother’s plant stand that I use on the porch…. gone.

My glass hummingbird feeders…. gone.

I was no longer excited.

And when I went outside to check exactly what it was he was selling?

Yeah.

It was 100% mine.

Bags of clothes slated for Salvation Army donation, kitchen ware I was going to give his niece who’s moving into her first apartment, books that I trade with a friend.

He even had my hydrangea fertilizer on the table.

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But the worst part? The part that really had my jaw clenched….

He set this all up, and left.

Went to visit his brother and expected me to sit there and sell all the items I had no intention of selling in the first place.

The man has a death wish.

There’s really no other explanation that makes sense.

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We will prevail….

June 23, 2019 Rivergirl 29 Comments

Time for our annual battle with the flowering quince.

My husband hates trimming this bush. Hates it with a passion.

The monster is covered in thorns and not easily tamed. Cutting a path through uncharted Amazon rain forest while being chased by pygmies with poisonous darts might actually be preferable.

Every year we do it, and every year he grumbles.

This year he suggested using the chain saw.

But I had visions of this:

And managed to dissuade him.

I started with the electric hedge trimmer…

And managed to cut smaller branches away from the house.

Then the husband brought the ladder and the muscle.

Quince bushes are hard wood, and mature ones like ours fight back.

I was tempted to suggest something like this:

But managed to hold my tongue.

While he was angrily hacking away at that, I moved over to the also out of control Burning Bushes.

These turn a vibrant red in the fall and are much easier to trim.

But I didn’t get very far because hidden in between them and the boxwood? I found a catbird’s nest.

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No, not that kind.

This kind.

And I scared the poor mother right off it.

(Worry not, she’s back.)

Avoiding the nest meant the bushes are still large, but at least you can see the windows now. The top half anyway.

As for the quince…

My idea of a neatly shaped shrub differs greatly from the husband’s …

But he had a sharp implement in his hands and I figured I shouldn’t push the issue.

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Yes, dear.

It looks fine.

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Because he can’t stand it when I’m right.

June 12, 2019 Rivergirl 44 Comments

He really can’t.

Remember when I blogged about the husband’s new toy not fitting in our old barn/shed?

It looked something like this:

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I was right…

And apparently that didn’t sit well with the other half so he did a little remodeling.

This is our old shed/barn that needs to be torn down.

Years ago, it housed a horse.

Now?

It’s a pile of rotted wood.

How rotted?

Really rotted.

It’s an eyesore that drives me nuts every single day.

The fact that it’s still standing defies all logic.

I’ve come to the conclusion that it hates me…

And refuses to die just because it can.

But back to the tractor.

The husband figured if he could straighten out a door…

He could get it inside.

Which he did, but not far enough inside due to that pesky center pole.

You know the one…

It holds up the rotted roof?

Yeah.

We don’t need that.

Mission accomplished.

He proved me wrong… and got the tractor in the shed.

How long there will be a roof over it is anyone’s guess.

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Boys and their (too damned big) toys.

June 1, 2019 Rivergirl 60 Comments

The husband had been sputtering about one for a year, so I knew ….

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Naturally he had to have the biggest one they sold…

And we had to rent a damned trailer to get the silly thing home.

Sigh.

Did we need a lawn mower with a cut radius almost as wide as I am tall?

No.

But we’ve got one now.

And contrary to popular belief…. bigger is not better when trying to fit said mower in your shed.

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I told him it wouldn’t fit before he bought it.

I told him it wouldn’t fit after he bought it.

You know where this is going, right?

It wouldn’t fit.

Yeah. Who saw that coming?

So now…

His precious car is going to live outside so the even more precious new toy can have half of the garage to itself.

Men and their toys.

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Driving women crazy since time immemorial….

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A modern fairy tale.

May 24, 2019 Rivergirl 40 Comments

Once upon a time there was a Princess.

We shall call her….

River.

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(River has been called a lot of things in her day, but never a Princess.

So if you’re calling?

Make it loud.)

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Princess River loves her flowers. She plants them whenever and wherever she can.

And since the Princess lives in a kingdom that’s covered by snow and ice half of the year?

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She takes her plantings seriously.

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When she first moved into her castle, she toiled long and hard until she had the biggest and most beautiful garden bed in the land.

In early summer it sprouted stunning displays of Lupine….

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And myriads of other riotous, colorful blooms all season long.

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Princess River was content.

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This went on for many happy years until her husband, the evil Prince, started mowing in close proximity to the bed. He also mowed in the wrong direction.

Bad Prince.

Bad!

She asked him to be more careful.

She pleaded with him to go the other way.

But month after month the dastardly toad blew grass clippings in to her carefully tended flower garden.

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(You do.

And I shall…)

The Princess weeded, she turned the soil, she mulched…. but to no avail.

After a year or two, the grass took over.

It choked all Princess River’s lovely flowers to death.

Princess River was not happy.

She had to leave the castle and hump 12 bags of mulch across the moat.

She had to wack down all her blooms, rake up the dead bodies, reset the brick border, lay weed block paper, re-mulch and reset the pavers that anchored the Royal Bath of Birds.

The sky darkened. The wind blew.

It started to rain.

And she ran out of mulch.

(Mathematical coverage formulas were never her strong suit.)

Princess River had to abandon her project when a deluge of biblical proportion battered her royal self.

She will be victorious…. someday.

Until then she will slowly plot her revenge upon the evil Prince and his heinous grass cutting machines.

She will plan carefully.

The punishment must fit the crime.

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Birthday presents no one gets excited about.

April 7, 2019 Rivergirl 29 Comments

We recently celebrated my husband’s birthday.

And as I posted earlier, among other things….

I gave him a rock.

Because I’m that kind of wife.

We celebrated at a friend’s house, and naturally he was speechless.

Okay, at first he didn’t know what the hell it was.

But that’s not always a bad thing. And he could honestly say no one had ever given him a rock before… so that should count for something.

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But if you thought that was odd?

Witness the gift our friends gave him.

At first it was a box filled with the weirdest packing peanuts I’d ever seen.

Then it was a little box that said..

And then…

And…

Are you noticing the trend?

This went on forever.

And while I’m sure it was funnier with the 3 margaritas I’d had, even sober ….you have to applaud the effort.

Finally he reached the end.

And I thought, oh yeah.

This is going to be good.

I was wrong.

Very, very wrong.

Huh?

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Turns out it was a war nickel which had popped up while my husband was playing poker with the guys a while back. Husband is a coin collector, and had explained what it was to the group.

war nickel

So….

Yeah.

They gave him a nickel.

And I gave him a rock.

Do we know how to make a birthday boy happy or what?

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Because I’m that kind of wife.

March 26, 2019 Rivergirl 30 Comments

My husband recently had a birthday.

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Yes.

I’m that kind of wife as well, but I digress.

Along with some very nice, serious gifts…

I ordered him something from Amazon.

The box it came in was rather disappointing.

But nothing could dampen the sheer joy I felt at giving him….

A rock.

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Yes, Cindy.

I did.

I bought him a rock…

A rock!

Or rather, a solid metal rock replica.

Because after our recent vacation in Arizona, and all the amazing rocks we saw out there… ( did I tell you about that? I seem to remember some subtle mentioning of rocks) …. I had to present my beloved with his very own rock (replica).

And may I just say?

Bravo Amazon.

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I don’t know what kind of algorithm you’re running, but as I was searching the mystery/thriller book section?

You recommended a rock.

Talk about knowing your audience.

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And so am I.

I never knew Jeff Bezos had time to read my blog.

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Peace, love…. and no thanks.

March 21, 2019 Rivergirl 51 Comments

It’s been a long running joke in our marriage that my husband went to Woodstock ….

(Yes, the original. And yes, he’s that old)

Took a look around, and left.

Left!

Left the greatest live musical event in history!

I know, that was my reaction too.

The joke is, had I known this disturbing piece of information before we got married… it would have been a deal breaker.

In August of 1969, when the counter culture was doing this?

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And listening to this?

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I was…

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Yeah. Walking the dog with some sassy red kicks.

Needless to say, I was too young to attend.

So years later, when I heard my beloved other half say Woodstock “wasn’t his scene”, and that he had hitch hiked to New York that August, joined the throngs of hippies walking to the concert, “saw a bunch of half naked people dancing and smoking dope” and decided to leave?

A little piece of me died.

I would have killed to be there. Rain, mud et al.

In my hippie days of the late 70’s, the closest I got was following the Dead around New England… or going to the Claremont Music Festival in New Hampshire. We camped out, we smoked weed, it rained… but it still wasn’t Woodstock.

And now, in August 2019 on the 50th anniversary? There’s another Woodstock brewing.

I was thrilled!

The husband even agreed to go!

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(Probably just to shut me up about the first one, but who cares!)

And then I saw the list of performers.

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And while a few of the original artists will be there…. Santana, Fogerty from CCR, Country Joe McDonald and David Crosby (no, I’m not counting Dead and Company with John Mayer. Please! Without Jerry, they’re not the Dead)…. scanning the list made me want to cry.

Soccer Mommy? Pussy Riot? Amigo the Devil?

Damn. I must be old, because I don’t know half of these groups. And while I love the Black Keys, Dawes, The Lumineers, and a handful of others? My need for more classic rock, folk or blues from back in the day makes me think to hell with it. You can’t go home again.

And apparently you can’t go back to Max Yasgur’s farm either because the event is being held 150 miles away in Watkins Glen.

At the race track.

With a limited amount of tickets because they’re worried about traffic jams.

Traffic jams?

Good god.

There’s even an app.

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Peace, love and music?

I doubt it. The Millennials have taken over and it will probably be merchandised to within an inch of it’s life and have more to do with profit than peace and brotherhood.

Sigh…

Sorry husband. It looks like you’re still going to have to take my crap about leaving the first one.

And rightfully so.