OK, last week I started the, “Let’s NOT Allow Our Hubbies to Annoy Us, So We Can Have Better Marriages” experiment. We’ll pick one pet peeve per week that we’re going to ignore, until we all have the perfect, flawless, annoyance free marriage, I imagine Angie and Brad have.
This week we’re talking TRASH DAY (feel free to insert your own grievance).
We’ve lived in our home for about 9 years or 936 trash days. I know, most people prefer to count in years. Though, I think the British count in trash days or do they use the metric system? I’m not sure which. Anyway, we’ve had the same trash days (Mon. and Thurs.) every week.
Yet somehow, my husband forgot to take out the trash both days last week. Not just one day, which he’s usually good for, once every three weeks, I’m talking both! Frankly, I can’t wrap my head around it.
Forgetting trash day isn’t like forgetting to pick up toothpaste. One does not peek into the neighbor’s bathrooms to see if their tubes have run dry, nor do we all run out of Crest at the same time. HOWEVER, one does get a peek at the curbs of about 50 neighbors with large green plastic containers on the curb; and yep, our day is the same as everyone else’s.
Why doesn’t my husband notice the cans littering the street and turn back to set ours out when he’s mere feet from the house? I wonder. “There’s no conspiracy here honey, the neighbors aren’t putting out all their cans, simply to watch you turn around and put out ours, so they can snicker behind your back, “Dumbass, fell for it again! Hee hee hee, now let’s all go schlep our trashcans back into our garages,” high-fives all around!
“The garbage collectors are also not fucking with you, by changing up the days they will collect our junk. Nope, they have better things to do, like leaving the can in the direct path of my car, which often ends with me extracting it from the undercarriage and hoping it pops back into shape.” Those are the jokes they play, duh?
My husband’s standard response, “I forgot, and I didn’t notice all the other trashcans.” I get it, I’m no ogre, it was an honest mistake (made at a 1:6 ratio. Not that I’m counting), but he has like two weekly jobs around the house: trash and light bulbs.
Could you imagine if us moms just forgot 50% of our jobs any given week? Like, “Oops I forgot to feed the kids this week and seeing other people eat, or even eating myself didn’t remind me. But for the record, I also drove carpool this week and I got them to and from school everyday. Yep, I didn’t even miss one!”
So, this week, I won’t mention the trash once. Even though I noticed, just this morning, that there was a ton of recycling stuff in the regular bin – where it should NOT be. I also won’t breathe a word about all the stuff in the small cans in our office and bathrooms, which clearly weren’t emptied. No, I’m taking this experiment seriously. Zipped, are my lips.
On a side note, last week’s experiment went really crappy! I mentioned that my hubs parked in the farthest spot one time and noticed that he was too close to a car another time. I said, “Didn’t you read last week’s column about how much your parking annoys me!” To which he responded, “Yes, did YOU?”
Touché.
Is it just me or does your husband have trashcan blinders too?
Not just you. Next week can you please address the concept of the dishwasher? My husband has forgotten what it is and gets annoyed at putting away clean dishes.
Oooh don’t worry Jennifer … Dishwasher is on the list. Mine rarely gets dishes into the sink let alone the washer so you may have done some excellent training already and not even know it.
UNacceptable. John does not have many “tasks” around here but that one, without question falls to him. He misses it every once in a while (um today). But that one I will allow since there IS a hurricane up in our grill to deal with.
I don’t know Kiran – once you let him skip a day … well, you know how it goes. I live in Florida, in fact I think the first time him missed trash day was a hurricane. Hmmm.
I laughed all the way through this post. It’s exactly the same over the pond in Britain even down to the cans being left to be run over (or in our case blocking the gate to the garden) – wait, why would I think it would be different?
Though I am jealous of your 2 trash days a week – we get one a week and even that alternates between general rubbish and recycling; so we have stinky food hanging around for up to 2 weeks – urgh!
I can’t use excuses such as “I’m sorry, I did not notice that the carpet looks like a dog has died and shed it’s hair (we have 4) and so did not hoover up” because Hubby thinks I am too obsessive about cleaning anyway and would argue that there is very little hair there anyway.
Anyhoo, here’s a potential solution – get the children to put the trash out. Mine does, though now that she has hit 18 I cannot deduct money from her allowance if she “forgets” to do it.
I like it Ribena. I always forget to put my children to good use. I mean, didn’t we breed them for such things: trash dishes laundry? Thanks.
I really shouldn’t complain, about my husband not putting my clothes away after he does the laundry…I mean how many of us have a husband to do the laundry anyway. Also, I guess I shouldn’t complain about the way he removes the kitty litter. (I got him to take care of that after my operation) and now that he has nothing else to do, I think I made him feel guilty about asking me to do anything. But, I can sill complain about something…I’ll think hard.
I could think of some for you, if you get stuck!
We only put out trash once a week now because neither of us can remember the second day! I don’t get why he only takes the kitchen trash out. Does he not see the overflowing can in the kids’ bathroom? Also he likes to cook his lunch, baked chicken every single work day, and puts the nasty chicken debris in the kitchen can after he takes the garbage out! Then I have a nearly empty can, that stinks to high heaven! But I love him.
If we just end every complaint with, “but I love him,” I think we can say pretty much anything.
The times my hubs actually remembers to take out the trash (which is rare) he gathers every trash can in the house, big and small, and takes them to the kitchen. He dumps them and then takes the bag outside. Then allllll the trash cans linger, moved here, shoved there, never to be returned to their proper places, that is until I do it myself. It is the most annoying thing in the world! Who doesn’t take a trash bag around the house to collect in!?!
I have never heard that one and I LOVE IT!!! I love when someone else’s husband does something ridiculous, it gives me great comfort to imagine all your cans in one room. THANK YOU
I KNOW. He doesn’t get thr chance to forget at my house. I “helpfully remind” him and then he says “they won’t come early. They never do. I have time.”. Shut the front door. What about every other time when they come early and then I have rotting stinking fly attracting trash on my damn carport for another week. The worst part is that he doesn’t understand why I care so much as “we don’t live on the carport and a few flies never hurt anyone”. AAAGGGHHHH
Who would think trash could be so frustrating. I’m telling you my experiment WILL, nay MUST work for the longevity of our marriages! I like when I hear the truck and go running out in my undies and a t-shirt, trying to switch between pulling the can and pulling down my shirt so I don’t give the garbage men a show!
Jenny, you are fucking hilarious! Are you sure we aren’t married to the same man and now we’ve just busted him as being a bigamist?!
I mean it’s possible though mine spends much time watching football and other sports (including classic games that have already been played) I don’t know where he would find the time to be your husband and lounge around your abode. Ex-conjoined twins maybe? Mark does have a weird unexplainable scar that runs the entire length of his left side …
Yep, there are some problems I overlook. My hubby sometimes actuall bags up the trash like he actually intends in getting it outside. Then for some odd reason he’ll put the bag in the powder room and there it sits. I guess some days he doesn’t see the wisdom in getting it from the powder room to the outside can to the curb. I could by snyde and make a stinging comment about how his brain works ( I’ve studied psychology) or I could let him read this comment.
You’re and amazing wife. You look past it and that’s step one! Step two: dump the trash bags into his underwear drawer… he’ll never forget again!
Very cute blog. I sometime come a little short of actually getting the trash out. I do get it rounded up and into the powder room ,approx, 15 feet from the outside can. I’d request a 80% completion rating. Even though I’ve gotten it almost there, accumulating in the powder doesn’t seem to satisfy my DEMANDING wife. I guess when it comes to trash etiquette, it’s 100% or nothing. Guess I’ll have to move it that extra 15′ . Maybe the room will smell better.
NO don’t change… don’t ever change. Then we women would have nothing to bitch about!
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My fav is when they forget, and they ask you “well why didnt you do it?” Oh yes let me add ANOTHER thing to my neverending list