Husband has a hobby

[PepsiMarx]

People always refer to their husband's hobby, (usually he's off most of Saturday leaving the OP to care for 4 kids and the dog and coordinate a children's party) but never say what it is. This is usually because the hobby will be "outing". Unless it's swimming the coast of the UK dressed as Mr Blobby, the hobby will never be outing and the whole thread is derailed as people guess the hobby and OP argues relentlessly that it's not relevant. Can there be a ban on non specific hobbies ?

What's your AIBU?

What the hobby is is irrelevant. The posts are usually about their impact

It doesn't matter whether the hobby is origami or ice fishing

It is in almost all cases about fairness and equity and your partner being fair and you not being the default.

In how many cases would we actually say, oh if that is the hobby then fair enough he should just crack in then...

To be fair, it’s usually cycling or golf, and that’s very outing 🤣🤣

It's cycling.

It's always cycling so it doesn't matter

So why can't you get a hobby?

Yeah, I often think that, to say my husband goes to play golf, or goes cycling or to watch Arsenal, it’s hardly outing is it.

I think it's done on purpose to make their husbands sound exciting. Otherwise why not just say it's hiking or golf or something like that?

I agree completely!! The sheer number of Lycra clad men on the roads here, or groups of club swinging polo shirt wearing ones on the greens show that golf or cycling are NOT outing. Statistically golf is now as popular to play as football or cricket apparently, with something like 6million ish players in the U.K.

69% of them are men!!

I had no idea that guess the hobby was such a compulsion. Perhaps people should keep their curiousity in check rather than requiring hobby specification as part of the OP.

@PepsiMarx yabu. It's not necessarily the hobby itself that is outing, but the hobby combined with the other circumstances and (if they didn't name-change) circumstances in their previous threads too.

Plus, there will always be people who either empathise with or are pre-disposed to hate the husband's hobby, which might derail the thread in another way.

As soon as some says ‘I can say what the hobby is as it outing’ people are going to be curious.

But also ops often (not always) try and explain in a complex way, why a conversation won’t work and how they kind of understand their husband attending. Which often doesn’t make sense without the context.

But it usually cycling or golf. The amount of mners that think very few married men do these hobbies is a bit odd.

Perhaps it is the word 'hobby' that is the problem. We don't normally think of our leisure activities as 'hobbies'. It conjures up an image of a gentleman curate collecting butterflies or a 1970s big brother painting Airfix.
So when it is applied to a real-life husband in the wild it feels sort of exotic.

It's often cycling, with running and golf snapping at its heels- which isn't outing because they are so common.

If they compete in crazy golf at an elite level fair enough, keep it secret.

My ex played football all winter and cricket all summer grrr.

I agree not to name the hobby is distracting from the main thread. I think even if it is golf, just say it's cycling and visa versa for completeness in the thread and to avoid being outed.

I always assume it’s model railways/trainspotting or something considered more nerdy than cycling or golf. “Expensive hobby” means Warhammer or gaming I reckon.

I had a chuckle inserting the model railways into the thread about the husband drying his “wet and smelling kit” arojnd the house 😬

Saying your partner cycles or fishes or plays cricket might not be outing by itself, but combined with all the other information plus their previous threads then it could well be.

I assume it's either because details can add up, or because people will obsess about the hobby rather than the dilemma.

Any thread about cycling, regardless of whether the man is being an arse or not, always leads to dozens of unnecessary body shaming comments about men for daring to wear appropriate exercise clothing. What a man's body has to do with the acceptability of a weekly Saturday morning ride or the selfishness of buggering off for 8 hours every Saturday is beyond me!

Perhaps people should keep their curiousity in check

Perhaps you should do one!

Guessing is half the fun. It's either cycling or golf anyway.

Something that takes the husband out of the family equation for massive chunks of time.

It’s always golf or cycling.
My dh’s hobby is running, fortunately it only lasts as far as he can manage now he’s getting older.😂

Because it all adds up. Every post about roughly where you live, how many kids you have (and their sex), your job, how many cars you have etc can build up a picture of who you are and then throw in something like your husband's hobby can be really outing.

For example if you've posted before about living in a remote village in the north of England and your husband's hobby is axe throwing, then you've basically outed yourself.

But then people fixate on the sport. If it's golf and the problem is the husband being out of the house for hours at a time, but OP says it's cycling, the advice will all be about what cycle routes he takes, what type of roads he's on, then descend into slagging off cyclists wearing lycra, body shaming, the rights and wrongs of cyclists, someone claiming that they should pay road tax if they want to be riding on the roads etc.

YANBU especially because 99% of the time it’s cycling, golf or football.

The association of cycling and golf with middle-aged husbands on here is very funny to me. The only man I know who wears lycra got into cycling because of his cycling-obsessed girlfriend and the only golfers I know are women.