Bollocks! Fuck! Arse!

[MitziK]

Working from home: Day 10,000 (or whatever the fuck day it is now).

Peaceful, quiet, sunny, warm - birdsong and the occasional whingeing DTwatCat wanting me to go into the garden and entertain him with a pointy stick to chase.

DP eventually emerges from upstairs five hours after I do (which is fine by me, it means I don't have to endure shite like reruns of Nightrider and the fucking A Team). Makes a cup of tea. Great.

I'd vaguely noticed things had been moved in the region of the Cupboard under the Stairs, but as I haven't really seen him move much over his furlough period, I assumed he'd dropped something when I heard some scrabbling noises.

Oh, how wrong I was. He had been in The Cupboard - looking for stuff.

I spent ages carefully organising and stacking DIY items in there. They're my tools. My million rawl plugs, bolts, screws, brackets, saws - I do the flatpacks. I do the plumbing repairs. I do all of it. Not because he doesn't want to, but because I'm good at it and like fixing, building, mending and improving things. He gets enlisted when some grunt work is required. Very simple, unambiguous instructions - this is a person who, for all his intelligence and degrees, if you tell him 'look to your right', will inevitably start spinning round anticlockwise and fall to his left. He is definitely spatially disabled.

He's come out and said 'I finally found them!'.

What?

'Shelf brackets! They were really hard to find!'

Right hand side, three inches to the right of the door behind the case that holds all the shelf fixings and in front of the drill cases?

'Oh. You knew where they were?'

'Well, I did put them there in the first place' because I don't believe in rummaging around for three hours and spent a lot of time and effort in planning how my DIY stuff was stored so I can go there and instantly lay my hands upon anything I need. 'Why?'

'No reason' and he wanders off.

Ten minutes later, I hear thumping sounds. He's only decided that today is the day he is going to fit a shelf over the bathroom door to put baskets on place the toiletroll stash.

Very, very calmly, I try to find out whether he's considered that the planks need to be cut to size. And remind him that the tenon saw would be the appropriate choice (rather than the pruning one from my equally well organised gardening equipment). And that the workbench currently lives in the shed of a thousand spiders and he'd better not be planning to continue sawing directly onto the kitchen table if he wishes to live until teatime.

Oh, and the wood needs to be painted to increase its lifespan in a humid environment. And wood screws are in the case marked Wood Screws, rather than the short brass ones meant for picture hanging.

It's all in hand, apparently. He's just going to put it up temporarily and then take it down to paint it.

He's already snapped my shovel handle two days ago. And I've just reset some of the slabs on the patio, so I can't hide the body do any more digging.

Please, make it stop.

joys

I have an Arfur. Because he does half a job. So:

Needs to change a light bulb. Goes to his Cupboard (it has gained proper noun status and must be said with reverence)

Sees the sprocket set in The Cupboard. Gets it out to put in the shed (less revered). Opens sprocket set to check it's all there, decides to clean them and gets them all out on table.

Gets the special man cleaning stuff out of another, far inferior cupboard. Cupboard squeaks.

Puts cleaning stuff on table. Goes to shed to get the oil.

Oh! The shed is a bit untidy. Impacts all of the fucking shed onto the bastard yard.

Finds box of Lego / board game / toy robot at back of shed. It had been put there for a reason.

Comes in to show DS his findings. This can go two ways. Either Teen DS is not interested or it is Very Cool. Unfortunately this is a Very Cool day. Hours are lost.

It's getting dark. DH goes to put on the light. Oh no...we need a light bulb.

(I am in the bath with a bottle very large glass of wine and my kindle.

Sorry. Stuff was sort of put back. Well, balanced precariously at the front of the cupboard, rather than expertly Tetrised into their designated spots to maximise space and ease of finding things. It was a 6/10 for effort.

Well fair play, that could have been much worse.

Day 10,001.

He went to the local DIY shop and purchased another saw.

I went outside. I asked very neutrally if he'd done anything like it before. 'I can saw a piece of wood'.

After getting the plasters, I noted that the workbench is still in the shed, but I'd be happy to start the cut off and then sit on the end of the planks to reduce their sideways movement.

Some gentle guidance and demonstration of how to position the hand so that the thumb isn't the first thing that's sawn ensued. I then finished the first plank off, as I needed to exemplify the angle (ie, not straight across horizontally) and what 'draw' means, along with the way to make sure you don't split the end.

Everything remained calm and peaceful and he cut the other planks without further injury, although sawing with an arm motion rather like doing the Birdie Song caused him a little discomfort. 'You use your whole arm from the shoulder to play guitar. This is like that' sort of helped.

I then introduced him to the palm sander. Didn't realise that 'Go with the grain' was a mystical incantation. But it doesn't really matter. They're going to be painted anyhow. 'Same pressure as your shaver' worked pretty well, though.

'Why are you cleaning up already?' as I swept the sawdust onto the grass. The cat promptly hurled himself into the remaining bits and rolled around until he looked vaguely flammable. 'Oh'.

The last development of the day was his offering up of the pieces to ensure they fit the recess. He is rather pleased that the piece of wood fit said gap adequately. And that he now knows what offering up means.

Tomorrow may involve paint, drills and screws.

And work was quiet enough that nobody noticed I'd been away from my computer for two hours to attain this level of completion.

All in all, a relatively controlled day.

Why can't he go back to work-

Day 10,003.

Holes are being drilled. I am not part of this anymore, as I expressed bemusement at the suggestion bolts would be better for attaching three pieces of wood together than actual wood screws.

At least it's the weekend.

I'm going back into the garden.

Good luck

oh christ.

There is another one. Mine has at least used canisters of weed killer for the lawn. he mentioned that he may as well mix them up into one canister.

I am currently in the process of sorting out life insurance....

Dh is outside building a wall from the patio slabs. He was adamant that we’d have the wall finished today (despite not starting it until yesterday afternoon). He was so adamant that he’d finish today he asked me to ask the lady who runs the stables where I ride to drive her poop trailer round and empty it so we have nice manurey soil for growing.

We now have a pile of horse shit in our garden.

Thanks everyone, I haven't laughed so hard in ages. I currently am DH less as mine died in 2014, so my house is an oasis of calm ha ha ha. 26 yo DD, 15 yo DS, both Asperger's, can spend hours arguing over whether or not the monitor is plugged into the right port. I'm staying out of it with the music on loud.

I have attempted to interest them in sorting the garden but I think they're afraid of getting lost in the primeval weeds or being eaten by raptors.

I was swearing to myself earlier when I went into our brick shed to find something I knew was in a cupboard. But DH had been there before me and everything he had ever taken out of and returned to the shed was now on the floor in a long line leading away from the door.
So I had to unblock the doorway first by taking every bastard thing out ,and then carefully putting them back in again where they belong.

I was swearing because I have to do this every few months when it all gets so bad I can no longer out one foot in front of the other with all of the crap that blocks the doorway.
Why oh why do they do this?

Why oh why do they do this?

You may pick from one of the below:

a) because they are huge wazzocks
b) because they are huge wazzocks
c) because they are huge wazzocks

I am very smug. My dh has washed the patio, tidied the shed and done the shopping.
I have a gammy leg and can't walk, so I am sitting in the garden with a cup of tea observing his efforts.
He is mine and nobody else can have him.

Ooh.
Mine has been steadily getting more and more on my (36 week pregnant, very hormonal) nerves.
There are many stories! But the latest was yesterday. When given the choice of whether to tidy up the living room or the kitchen, he chose kitchen. I went ahead and tidied the living room, took about 10 mins.
I went into the kitchen to take his cups in. He was standing beside the dishwasher looking at his phone. Nothing had been touched.
'Are you ok?' I ask.
'Yes. Did you know we live in a very hard water area? Did you know that 'hard' and 'soft' water are blah blah blah blah'
'No darling. I didn't know. That's interesting!' I say, as I begin to (passive aggressively) wash some pots, tidy up the sides, etc, etc.
He disappears into another room. Comes back when I have finished. I am fuming (again, passive aggressively. I knew if I said anything, I'd say it ALL). He takes the huge pack of dishwasher salt out of the cupboard and puts it on the side I've just wiped down.
He then walks out of the room again.
I go into the living room to seethe silent.
Then he comes in the living room and remarked that the cleaning he did (1 month ago!!!) had meant that the living room looked great after I'd given it just a '5 minute job'. Nothing to do with the fact that I cleaned it a few days ago then.
And breathe

Bey, why are you being so nice/PA? Just tell him to get the fuck on with the jobs. He's cleverly got you running round doing his share while you're heavily pregnant? You've been well played!

He came and sat beside me in silence.

You know how you can feel the cat staring at the side of your head without having to look at it? That feeling.

I strung it out for ten minutes as I was watching YouTube videos. By the time I couldn't stand the waiting anymore, I'd gone from companion planting for tomatoes to setting up an off grid homestead in deepest Alaska and making bone broth from Roadkill Moose.

Picking my way through the now sawdust covered bathtowels, slightly disturbed looking cat and 20 different drillbits, I see he's put the brackets up.

But he can't complete installation, as he doesn't have the 'right' things to attach the wood to the brackets. Nothing is narrow enough to go through the bracket holes or long enough if it's narrow enough or too long if it's narrow enough. The DIY store opens at 8am Monday.

He's now checking his work emails in case they want him in for training Monday morning and I'm watching some biblical movie thing and wishing for a plague of frogs to descend upon the house.

In fairness, he has gone to the shop and picked up what I actually wanted instead of whatever has a yellow sticker on, so at least food will be acceptable this weekend. As long as he cleans up the carnage up there so I can use the bath for about four hours.

@Candyflosscookie tbf, he would have done it eventually, i can just not help myself!

you have made me feel ill. at the point where he was under the stiars in your diy stuff.

16 years ago I painted the understairs cupboard... within a month he had yanked the suitcase out scratching all the walls. he promised to fix it. I am still waiting. mind you he has not lived here for 8 and a half years, but small children are growing up to be teens who move stuff and don't put it back... agggghhhhh

My mum has a double garage with 1 side of it as her workshop, with all her manual tools, power tools, paints, varnishes, oils, tape measures, spirit levels, screws and assorted fixings etc etc etc set out beautifully above a tidy double workbench with multiple power outlets, a radio and a spotlight.

It is a thing of wonder.

She's divorced.

Just sayin'

Loving this thread. Sorry about the dh's, but it does make very good reading.

@Thisismytimetoshine i thought that. Obviously spending too much time arranging the cupboard full of the precious tools and not doing anything useful with them.

Sounds like half the blokes on this thread aren’t allowed to shit without the wife telling them how wiped properly.

My DH always says to me "Do not talk about the tools. Do not think about the tools. Do not acknowledge the tools."

He potters about in his workshop doing woodwork (he made a planter last month...) Meanwhile, I am slowly painting all the rooms in the house, putting up shelves, changing door handles, fitting new wardrobe doors, installing laminate flooring, sewing blinds and curtains, painting the garage, cutting and fitting new glass beading, putting up roller blinds...

Yet I have to ask to "borrow" our tools that he keeps in his workshop so they're never on hand when I want them and I use them more often than him anyway

What a wonderful piece of writing, OP. Just beautiful.

This is funny, very well written, and your DH does sound infuriating (and clueless at woodwork 😂). Not to be a fun sponge, but he also sounds like me. I have dyspraxia, and seeing people laugh at someone who is “definitely spatially disabled” for having difficulty in judging the depth of a shelf or not automatically knowing how not to cut his fingers when sawing, cuts close to the bone.

(pun not intended