Saturday, March 01, 2008

The Bucket

Any of you have cats?

Cats will take over any horizontal surface in the house. Cats will lie down on a post-it paper in the middle of the living room carpet - just to prove it is theirs.

My husband is like a cat. He tends to take over any horizontal surface in the house with all of his stuff; not that he actually "lies down" on any horizontal surfaces, but he likes to "mark" said surfaces with all of his stuff. He likes to take up all of the horizontal space in our house with his keys, wallet, Blackberry, watch - whatever is in his pocket as he comes in from work each evening.

Kayla and I have tried to convince him to buy a man purse, but he is not going for it. Not even after we told him that Joey on Friends used one for a while.

Go figure.

So I tried a different tactic. A couple of years ago, I gave my husband a priceless, oriental ceramic bowl that had been handed down for five generations in my family.

OK. I bought it at TJ Maxx, but it's really pretty.

Anyway, I placed this bowl on the table in our entry way and I said "Honey, this is your bowl. This bowl is for your stuff. When you come in after work, you can put all of your oh-so-important things in this bowl. That way, all of your stuff will be in one place, and not lying around on various horizontal surfaces in the house. See how neat it is? It will hold your keys, wallet, Blackberry, and your watch. It's your own special bowl."

He started calling it his "bucket," and I started looking forward to the familiar "clank" of his stuff going into the bucket as he walked in after work each evening.

It seemed like a simple solution had at last been found. All of his stuff was contained discreetly and conveniently in his very own space, and I got to display my really neat bowl from TJ Maxx.

Except, now, he seems to be getting carried away and I am starting to feel my eye twitch with his over-dependence on his "bucket....."



Somebody send help.

2 comments:

Susiewearsthepants said...

I started one of those for The DQ because she is messy. I actually gave her a whole laundry basket. I told her if she didn't clean it out every day, that I would throw away what she didn't clean up. It didn't work. It didn't work because I forgot about the basket and eventually, so did she. I am still struggling with her being a slob, but I am trying......by the way, is your eye twitch one that is visible to others, or can you just feel it but when you try to look in the mirror, nothing is there? Do you ask someone to look at your twitchy eye only to be told that they can't see it? Just wonderin'

HW said...

Susie-
The twitching eye is kind of a joke, although my eye does twitch occasionally. We like to say it happens when something is driving my crazy. It happend for the first time while my doctor was examining me for headaches - perfect timing. He said "when did that start?" And I said "Um...right this minute."
It's only noticeable if somebody is really close to my face (which would actually make my eye twitch because I can't stand to have my space invaded)and it doesn't last more than a few seconds.
So there you have it. My freaky eye twitch.