To wish DH would just leave me alone, for one day?

[CarmerKharma]

DH has just been to the shop. I asked him to buy some chocolate biscuits of some kind so he came back with penguins.

I know it sounds trivial but he does this kind of thing all the time, really small, subtle things that are designed to wind me up but are SO subtle that if I moan it sounds like I'm losing my marbles to anyone else.

Like bread, I asked him to buy some bread and he came back with white bread. I can't eat white and he knows this.

A while ago I asked him to get me a magazine to read (he knew what I meant) and he came back with a TV guide thing.

Writing this down just sounds so stupid but it's a passive aggressive thing, he does things DELIBRATELY to annoy or wind me up but why??

Applauds Squeaver.

Is he a scatterbrain? Or just a complete arsehole?

ok here is another one.

I tell him I need a light to go above a picture in the hallway. I actually said "one of those lamp type lights that hang over the picture and light it up".

So he came home from work with a rusty, old brass outdoor light that he'd found at work...all smiles expecting praise.

Another one, I have a washing line across the garden. It is a little low but knowing what he's like, I knew better than to ask him to fix it otherwise he would probably break it completely.

So when I was out, he took it down altogether and re-fixed it onto 10 ft wooden poles. Now I can't reach the ffing thing at all and he stands there all smily expecting me to tell him how great he is.

you sound like a you are being very picky and he sounds like he is trying to do the right thing by you

if you hate him, leave

but its common sense not to fix the washing line 10 ft into the air, surely? or am I actually going mad because I feel like I am sometimes.

Could you please explain the Penguin thing?

Unless there is lots more you are not telling, I think you sound a bit paranoid actually. Why do you think its "a passive aggressive thing"? If you dont like what he buys you, buy your own mags, biscuits etc

I ate penguins as a kid. When the tin they were kept it was proffered, I was never offered a "bar", always a chocolate biscuit, these could be:

Penguins
Breakaway
Mint YoYo
Club (any variety)
Trio

The above are all in the biscuit family.

Chocolate bars, as squeaver so correctly put it, are the things you go into newsagents to buy when you've got PMT or have had a row with DH or decide might be a good idea for breakfast after a big night out, or a horrendous night in with a baby and a toddler. They cost approx 50p and, apart from ye olde biscuit boost, or ye olde Yorkie with biscuit and raisin, do not contain any biscuit based business whatsoever.

He just seems like a very, er, literal man?

Why not try the specific approach, and if he's still fucking you around with sub-optimal purchases, then you'll have the bastard banged to rights.

The biccies are neither here nor there but the other stuff...sure he isn't just a bit thick?

I don't suppose he has Asperger's Syndrome?

Indeed Sycamore

Carmer, honestly, is he just a bit simple?

sorry, the last bit about the light and the washing line do not sound passive aggressive, they just sound useless

Do your own shopping or write a list, which you then ask him to carry with him.

It's just stupid to send a non-mind reading male to the shop for something as vague as 'chocolate biscuits'.

He sounds just like my father who is adorable but an utter fuckwit.

sorry carmer but he sounds like a normal thoughtless bloke really. He's not being malicious as evidenced by his smiley-happy-with-himself-for-helping-out look. Mine does the same... I say can you make the bed please, and he throws the bedspread over rumpled duvets and pillows with head shaped dents in them and half heartedly chucks a cushion on top. It looks like ds has been jumping on it for an hour.... ditto emptying the bin (leaves bin bag badly tied up in the hallway) getting ds dressed in the morning (usually in shorts and t shirt in midwinter or vice versa, with nappy hanging off)... it goes on and on. You can cope with it in three ways... 1) teach him how you expect things to be done (ie properly) 2) be absolutely specific about what you want to the letter or 3) do it yourself or you can pull your hair out in frustration and get yourself worked up which helps no one, especially not yourself. Who said it's a man's world? It's most obviously a woman's world as we're the only ones who can do things properly

does he have these sort of problems at work/socially, or just with you?

I would never, ever ask my dh to buy me 'a magazine'! He's an educated intelligent bloke, but he's a/not a woman b/not me. I'd say, could you buy Vogue, or Red or Easy Living.
Penguins ARE chocolate biscuits, don't get that one.
If dh said oh, buy me a screwdriver, and didn't specify further, I'd be severely hacked off if he accused me of being passive aggressive or stupid for getting the 'wrong' type!

I would never, ever ask my dh to buy me 'a magazine'! He's an educated intelligent bloke, but he's a/not a woman b/not me. I'd say, could you buy Vogue, or Red or Easy Living.
Penguins ARE chocolate biscuits, don't get that one.
If dh said oh, buy me a screwdriver, and didn't specify further, I'd be severely hacked off if he accused me of being passive aggressive or stupid for getting the 'wrong' type!

hmm, just read about the 10ft washing line. Is he always this literal? What does he do for a living?

A few people have said he may have aspergers. I don't know enough about it really but my mother wanted a bog roll holder. She didn't specifically ask anyone for it, just mentioned that she needed a new one.

So DH came home from work with this rusty, silver bog roll holder, it looked about 10 years old and was filthy. He'd taken it out of a buidling that was being knocked down. I told him "we can't give her that" but he wouldn't listen and insisted. My mum looked at him like he was taking the piss and apparantly it went straight in the bin when we'd left.

well, when i hear 'chocolate biscuit', I don't think 'Penguin'

and a tv guide is not a magazine

sorry, thread moved on, too slow

PMSL that I tried so hard not to say, Thick, Simple or Fuckwit, and ended up with Literal...

Then you all just come out and say it!

I have a mental image of his arriving home from work with that lamp, a hopeful, puppydog expression on his face while it hangs, limply, squeaking and ever so slightly rusted from his hand.

Sorry to the OP, but this has become an unexpectedly funny thread, and tbh, I think there are worse things a man can do...

But you know, try my test and see what happens!