It's not really that diffcult...

To be on time, that is.

I grew up in a house run by a mother who believed that being on time meant being 10 minutes early. Whether it was work, school, church, an appointment, we were always a few minutes early. [I don't know what's happened over the years, but now I think my mother will be late for her own funeral. But I digress...]

Fortunately, Veronica is just as punctual as I am. For the most part...

Having young kids can make it challenging to be on time. They seem to have a knack for spilling something, losing something, or generally being a pain in the ass at exactly the wrong time. I understand that, and it doesn't really bother me too much.

But if you're always 5 minutes late, just start getting ready to go 5 minutes sooner.

Can't find your car keys? How about consistently putting them in the same spot?
Kids have trouble picking out clothes? Choose for them, let them know if they want to pick their own clothes, they can't dawdle around
[Can you tell what some of the issues are in my house?]

When I was in grad school, I had an office wife. She was, and still is, one of my best friends. We started and finished our degrees together and spent countless 10-12 hr days together over the 4 years we were students. During all that time, we talked about a number of different things and became really close, hence thinking of her as a second wife. And I was her office husband. Only without any sex...

When Veronica and I would meet with her and her husband, they were always late. She refers to him as functioning on MST, or Mexican Standard Time. Which is an impolite why of saying he was always late. And not even consistently so. Sometimes it would be 15 minutes, sometimes more, much more. But for whatever reason, she puts up with it.

Personally, I couldn't stand it if Veronica was always late. But if she was, I'd probably become such an over-bearing ass that she'd kick me to the curb in no time...

So how about you, is punctuality that important? Are you or your spouse always late?

Hubman (NSFW)

Sometimes apologies piss me off.

When I first told Shelle that I was interested in providing a guys point of view for this blog, one reservation I expressed was that I might have to hold back a little bit when discussing certain things that directly concern Veronica and could be construed as speaking negatively about her. When she and I first started blogging, we pledged to each other that we would not air our differences or disrespect the other on our blogs. Any time I write something about her that she might perceive as negative, I’ll ask her to read it first. I hope you’ll like what I like, but not at the risk of disturbing the domestic bliss I enjoy.

I’m not saying that I’m holding back at all in addressing this topic, but since it’s my first time contributing to Real World: Venus vs. Mars, I wanted to put that out there so that you understand why I might sometimes use general examples. Okay then….

Apologies are tricky things. Given too readily and I don’t think it’s sincere, do the same ‘thing’ over and over again, apologizing each time, and it’ll just piss me off. Very rarely is Veronica reluctant to apologize and at times apologizes when one isn’t called for. A benign example that actually happens in our house might go like this:

Me: hey honey, there are no more cans soda left in the fridge
Veronica: I’m sorry, I should have noticed and put some more in
Here is how it could have gone:
Me: hey honey, there are no more cans soda left in the fridge
Veronica: Well, you’re the soda drinker and took the last can. You
should have noticed and done something about it. You dumb ass…

Sometimes, she is too freakin’ nice, and lets me get away with crap. I think she was infused with an over-abundance of good old Catholic guilt as a kid growing up in a community with a large Jewish population. If anyone knows guilt, it’s Catholics and Jews. Even worse, her mother is a Brooklyn Eye-talian who went to Catholic school
for 12 years. The woman is a master with guilt. Veronica is a peace-maker and often works to placate others in order to maintain domestic tranquility. Me? Not so much. I hold stuff in, then get pissed off and blow up. So perhaps it’s partly my fault that she apologies so readily.

On serious matters when an apology really is appropriate, she is good, very good, at letting me blow off steam, then approaching me and offering a sincere apology. I hope I do the same for her when I need to. And believe me, there are times when I need to….

So, dear readers, how about you and your spouse, what do you think?

Hubman