How to (not) do nothing

Every once in a while Luc and I have an evening–or better yet an entire Saturday or Sunday–with nothing scheduled.

No kung fu. No baseball or hockey. No swimming or piano lessons.

No book club for me. No beer club for Luc.

No appointments, family engagements, neighbourhood get-togethers, recitals, birthday parties, drop-offs, pick-ups or errands.

We smile at each other. We sigh. “Ah!” we say in unison. “Let’s enjoy this! Let’s relish it! Let’s just do NOTHING!”

I’m not saying we’re experts or anything, but over our 17-year marriage, we’ve learned some very enlightening things about relationships and communication. One of which is “When you are both in total agreement in a particular situation, chances are you aren’t.”

This is what Luc means when he says “Let’s do nothing”:

“Let’s do nothing.”

This is what I mean when I say “Let’s do nothing”:

“Let’s do SOMETHING!”

For me, having a great swath of free time on the weekend (or even just a few free hours on a random Tuesday night) means the opportunity to tackle all of those household projects that just keep getting put on hold because we never have time to get around to them. You know, the decluttering of the basement. Or the reorg of the garage. Or at least the cleaning of the bathrooms.

Or if that’s too ambitious, there’s always stuff to pick up. Put away. Tidy.

Even if there’s absolutely nothing that NEEDS to get done (like that’s ever happened), I’ll putter. Move things around. Straighten piles. Fluff.

Drives Luc crazy.

Sometimes when we have these pockets of nothingness, Luc can actually convince me to JUST SIT STILL long enough to watch a movie together (which is about as far as his definition of “doing nothing” will stretch). But even so, chances are I’ll be simultaneously flipping through a magazine I haven’t had the chance to read, folding a few loads of laundry or balancing the budget.

I’ve tried to do nothing. I mean consiously sat down and tried NOT TO DO ANYTHING. But then I find my brain goes into overdrive and I start analyzing the fact that by trying to do nothing I’m actually doing something so really this is all just beside the point and I might as well get up and go do something else…

I’m pretty sure we’re free tomorrow night. A few free hours we can both enjoy and relish.

If I know Luc, he’ll be happy to do nothing.

And if he knows me, I’ll be doing…something.

Check out Luc’s thoughts on how to do nothing.

One More Thing to Celebrate!

Happy 1st Blogiversary, Luc!

Thank you for:

1. Taking me seriously when I suggested we take a course together on how to start a blog.
2. Showing up at said course.
3. Coming up with some of the most popular topics we’ve written about in the past year (“How to Load the Dishwasher” leads the pack by leaps and bounds).
4. Putting up with some of my suggestions (“Life of Pi” being the most painfully obvious).
5. Always being the first to like me.

Here’s to another year!

Love,

Moi

Check out Luc’s thoughts on our 1-year blogging anniversary.

 

Top 5 Things I’m Grateful My Husband Does (So I Don’t Have To)

There are a lot of things Luc does that I’m grateful for, many of which, strangely, involve alcohol (picking up a six-pack of Strongbow for me on his way home, pouring me a glass of wine without my asking, being the designated driver on date night because all it takes me is a glass and a half to not be able to be the designated driver…)

But there are certain things he does that I’m particularly grateful for because it means I don’t have to. Here are my top 5:

1. Dealing with the Lawn: I love gardening. I love flowers, trees and shrubs. I love planning, planting and pruning. I do not, however, love the lawn. Oh, I’ll mow it if I have to–I like the nice fresh lines it leaves. And I love taking out the weed-wacker and tidying up along the driveway and walkway and around the tree trunks. I even like to pull out my trusty edger to make sure there’s a nice clean separation between the lawn and my flower beds. I do not, however, like dealing with the lawn itself. The aerating, dethatching, weeding, fertilizing, overseeding. I find it a whole lot of work for very little payback. Luc, bless his soul, is the lawn man. Granted, every spring he’ll neglect the lawn until it becomes a neighbourhood embarrassment and can be ignored no longer, but once he gets it in his head to get it under control, he’s an aerating, dethatching, weeding, fertilizing, overseeding god, and ends up delivering the perfect foreground for my gardens.
2. Doing the Heavy Lifting: I like to rearrange furniture. And then I like to rearrange it again.  Especially when I’m in a mood. Then it’s right up there with cleaning closets, alphabetizing the spices and switching out the throw cushions on the sofa. And while I can pull those off on my own, I’m just don’t have the upper body strength (or lower…or any strength for that matter) to lug furniture about. Lucky for me, Luc is a pretty easy-going guy. He knows that when I ask him to move the baby grand to the other side of the living room “just so I can see how it looks over there” that it’s probably going to end up right back where it started. But after 20 years, he hardly bats an eye.
3. Making Homemade Hamburgers: You may not know this about me, but I’m a recovering carnophobic. A very specific strain of carnophobia actually. Let’s call it crudum-carnophobia.Yes, my name is Jen and I’m afraid of raw meat. Cooked meat: good. Raw meat: bad. Cooked homemade hamburgers: delicious. Digging my bare hands into ground beef to make said hamburgers: disgusting. Thankfully, Luc has inherited my Dad’s yummy burger recipe and he has no issues shaping a big-ass bowlful of minced dead cow into happy little patties and then barbecuing them to perfection for my consumption.
4. Refilling the rinse agent dispenser in the dishwasher: Luc and I may have different dishwasher loading techniques (and I still say mine is better) but there is one dishwasher-related chore that he does consistently and without fail: refilling the rinse agent dispenser. I could do it I suppose, it’s just never occurred to me to do it. Every once in a while I’ll see him on his knees in the kitchen dutifully pouring the Jet Dry into that ridiculously little hole and I’ll think, “Oh, yeah. Jet Dry.” And then I never think of it again until I see him doing it again. Our sparkling spot- and residue-free glasses are all because of Luc.
5. Telling the Kids “Lights Out”: Here’s what happens when Luc yells “Lights out!” up the stairs to the kids at bedtime: They close their books and turn off their lights with a chipper little “Bonne nuit, Papa!” Here’s what happens when I yell “Lights out!” up the stairs to the kids at bedtime: A sigh from one room. A whine from the other. A “Mommy, can I have a glass of waaaaater?!?” from one room. A “Mamaaaaa, I need a snuggle!!!” from the other. Throw in a “I’m too hot!” “I’m too cold!” “My sheets are tangled!” “My pillow needs to be fluffed!” and the “Mommy I need to tell you something in private” clincher and I’m ready to knock THEIR lights out. I know it’s cuz they love me. I know it’s cuz they just want a few more minutes of me. But by that time of night I’ve got nothing left to give. And ever since I complained to Luc about the kids’ mommy-specific bedtime issues with a “Oh my god, every night they just suck me into their vortex!” he’s taken over the lights out duties. Yep. I married a good man.

Check out Luc’s latest Top 5 list.

How to Load the Dishwasher

There are some things that Luc and I will never agree on. Most times we can agree to disagree. But when it comes to loading the dishwasher, I’m not even graciously admitting that maybe there’s more than one way to do it or that maybe his way is just as good as mine. Because it isn’t.

Why am I taking such a stand on this? Because he comes along behind me and reloads the dishes I’ve already loaded. It irks me. Because I know my way is fine. In fact, I know my way is best. (I’ll admit I’ve been known to do the same to him. But that’s only because he does it wrong.)

Here are my rules for loading the dishwasher:

Plates: Bottom, facing the middle.

Bowls: Bottom, also facing the middle.

Glasses: Top, wherever they’ll fit.

Pretty straightforward, right? (I think even Luc and I can agree on those three basics.) But here’s where the differences in dishwasher loading techniques really start to show…

Tupperware: Always on top–manufacturer’s instructions. Unless it doesn’t fit because the top is already jammed to overflowing with 48 individual pieces of Tupperware (damn those litterless lunches!) or because it’s too big to fit on the top. Then on the bottom. I’ll take my chances with it melting and leaving behind a sludgy plastic mess rather than taking the time to wash that blasted plastic by hand.

Note (clarification: Note to Luc): Do not jam all of the lids together in a row. The water will not get between them and get them clean. Ditto on piggy backing all of the containers one on top of the other. I repeat: The water will not get between them and get them clean.

Coffee mugs: Used to be the top. Now, because the top is perpetually jammed to overflowing with 48 individual pieces of Tupperware (see previous curse re: litterless lunches), the bottom. Added bonus: because they dangle precariously from the lower spikes instead of sitting snugly between them on the upper ones, the water doesn’t pool on the bottoms of the mugs and need to be sopped up with a tea towel every time you unload the dishwasher. (Stay tuned for a future blog on “How to Unload the Dishwasher”. Oh wait: just UNLOAD it.)

Cutlery: No spoons should be spooning. No fork tines should be intertwined. No peanut butter knives should be pressed up blade-to-blade with jam knives. I’ve heard both arguments: all down (so you can grab the clean handles when you unload–ooh, there’s that UNLOADING idea again) vs. all up (so the water sprays them better and they get cleaner). But really, alternating is the key: some up, some down.

Other: DO NOT EVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES put ANYTHING that has come into contact with raw egg into the dishwasher (yes, Luc, I’m talking to YOU). Not the bowl you nuked it in. Not the frying pan you fried it in. Not the whisk that whisked it, the fork that poked it or the spatula that flipped it. All that will happen is that the egg will cook into a rock-hard substance that can only be removed with a chisel. No, even if you put it back into the dishwasher a second (or a third) time (trust me, or even a fourth) it will not come clean.

p.s. The dishwasher is done. It needs to be unloaded.

See what Luc has to say!