Try as I might, I can't seem to shake the funk I'm in. I've started at least a half-dozen posts this month, only to delete them a few sentences later. I keep admonishing myself to keep a stiff upper lip and to follow the British Royals' example of 'Never complain, never explain' when it comes to my personal life - we all know that I'm more than happy to complain about my fellow man - not for nothin' is the Latin motto at the top of my sidebar:
Quero ergo scribo
(I bitch, therefore I blog)
Nonetheless, I haven't even felt like getting my snark on in the last few weeks. In part, I haven't been able to. Literally. Because Darling Husband (bless his heart) is a computer hog. When we got the shiny new laptop I am currently composing this post on, it was supposed to be for my use exclusively. But I made the mistake of offering to let Darling Husband use it a few times as an alternative to him disappearing into the office to use the desktop computer there for hours at a time. Silly me, I actually wanted his company, even if I had to share it with my computer. Unfortunately for me, he gets on and hours later, when it finally occurs to him that I might like to use my own computer, it's either too late in the evening or my window of opportunity for writing has passed. I have been sorely tempted to change my password so that he can't even get on my computer. But if I did that, he'd just go back to disappearing into the office for hours at a time. Honestly, he spends more quality time with the computers in the house than he does with me. And this has been true for years.
Is it healthy to be jealous of a machine?
Somehow, I don't think so.
Before you're tempted to leave me a well-meaning, nobly-intentioned comment about talking to Darling Husband about my feelings, please note that this has been an on-going bone of contention between us for years. For almost as long as we've been married, he has been obsessed with one computer game or another: Master of Orion, Tomb Raider, Master of Orion II, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, Civilization III ... and wouldn't you know it, these aren't the kind of games you can start and finish in say, thirty minutes, give or take. No sirree. In fact, Darling Husband has been playing one game on CivIII now for more than a year. No, don't have your eyes checked. You read that right: more than a year, same frickin' game. He started it in late 2008, people (!).
Adding insult to injury, after the man has finished a multi-hour session of the game, he goes to a website called CivFanatics (the name says it all, doesn't it?) and posts screen shots and play-by-play accounts of his turn sets. And then checks for comments repeatedly for hours after that.
I kid you not.
In addition to this, Darling Husband discovered The Fedora Lounge a couple years ago so that he could indulge in and feed his passion for fedora hats with other like-minded (read: obsessed) hat wearers. So he spends hours and hours on TFL reading posts about hats, posting about hats, browsing for hats, learning how to bash, re-bash, stretch, clean, rehab and convert hats. I've got my very own Mad Hatter on my hands, sans mercury poisoning.
And did I mention e-Bay? The man spends hours and hours trolling e-Bay for, yep, hats. Even though I put a moratorium on hat purchases for him until 2011. I frankly don't understand it. He says it's easier for him to troll e-Bay knowing he can't buy a hat. It would be the opposite for me - why torture myself with looking when I know I can't buy? I'll only find the greatest deal on the most wonderful whatever and be sorely tempted to buy when I know I shouldn't.
He thinks I don't want him to do the things he enjoys, the things that relax him, whenever I bring up just how much time he's spending doing them and suggest I am feeling neglected, which is rather unfair. I just wish he didn't spend so damn much time doing them. Is there no such thing as moderation?
Alas, when you're married to someone with an obsessive/compulsive personality, moderation is simply not a concept.
Add running his own business to the equation, and I come so far down on the list of things to do, it isn't even funny.
7 comments:
Keep Calm and Carry On, I just bought that paper holder and I look it everyday! My husband is a P in the A and that is putting it mildly!!! hehehehe
Have a nice weekend!
Deborah
My hubby does iRacing. He recently purchased his dream racing computer complete with three of the biggest monitors I've ever seen which are used so he can drive a race car and see the cars next to him. He has headphones and a mic. He talks to the other drivers.
We have from daughter's bedtime (usually 7:30-8pm) until about 9 pm for our respective computing. Then we sit together and complain about the Olympics or whatever we can find on tv.
Now that I have a blog I don't feel left out when he's away participating in his hobby. I keep busy on my own.
I hope you can find common ground or a happy place in your own mind where you can deal with his gaming habit. I do miss your regular snarking!
Mad Hatter indeed. I think you need to put a lock on DH's computer or a timer thingie so he has his own window of oppty to play and then has to shut it down...
I feel your pain. One time hubs spent hours and hours on the computer, when I quizzed him about what on earth he was actually doing, I found out that he was watching a you tube tutorial about how to solve a rubik's cube. No. I am not kidding. Days and days later . . . he did solve it. Minutes later the kids destroyed it. Aaah! revenge. He He!
So I'm lucky that my hubby doesn't like games on the computer,any type of video game or shopping online? Hmmm.....
But there's gotta be something wrong with him right?
Oh yea, he has selective hearing and a memory of only the things he wants to remember!
I often have to pry my Mr. away from cleaning.
Yes; cleaning.
"Stop vacuuming and come tell me how pretty I am."
Deborah: Every husband is a P in the A in one way or another ... it's a good thing we love them or they'd be in deep shit.
Joey: I can and do occupy myself all the time ... still, there is no substitute for good ol' face time with the person who is my best friend as well as my husband ... I'm a little tired of all his 'jealous mistresses' (aka, the games, The Fedora Lounge, his business).
Wye: I've considered putting a timer on him or suggesting he put a timer on himself, but I'm not his damn mother, know what I mean? I ought to be able to ask him to limit his usage and count on him to follow through. He is, in the local vernacular, a grown-ass man.
Annie: Isn't karma wonderful? And Schadenfreude, too?
Margaret: Selective hearing and memory? Yup, I think those come standard with every husband ... unfortunately. And the husbands say that nagging comes standard with every wife ... grr!
Housewife: Ah, yes, I didn't mention his occasional bouts of excessive cleaning because Darling Husband has sweetly pointed out that there aren't too many women out there who're gonna have any sympathy if I bitch about that ... I hate it when his point isn't just the one he wears his hat on ... You have my deepest sympathies!
Post a Comment