SIMPLY NOT SIMPLE

 Have you ever had to call "Tech Support" for anything ?  TV, Cell Phone, Computer . . . Or maybe you are trying to put together a piece of furniture,  or setting up a new fridge, washer or dryer.   The directions are just impossible to understand so you give in and call "Tech Support".  Once you have stated your problem the voice on the other end of the phone reassures you this is not a problem. They then follow that reassurance with the words, "You SIMPLY have to  . . ."  And this is where I loose it. I am still back at  trying to plug the machine in or just opening the package and they are twenty steps ahead of me. 

I remember way back when we got our first computer.  Our children and grand children will never appreciate what we had to go through to use a computer.  Plug in the screen, plug in the modem, put in a code for the screen, put in a code for the modem. And I am not talking about a simple 4 digit code. NO, those computers required entering a seven hundred and thirty five numbers, upper case letters, lower case letters and if you didn't get it exactly right you had to start all over again.  Then you had to wait about six hours for it all to process through before the computer actually turned on.  There was no Tech Support back in those days so you had to read the manual if you had one or call your best friend and hope they knew what to do.  I remember trying to get Husband to use the computer and he would get crazy when I was showing him something.  I would say, "It's simple! You just do . . . " and he would get upset and frustrated because I was going too fast.  Now I understand !!  

Now a days we just open the lap top and BAM !  ready to go.  Until you get to the web site you're looking for and can't get it figured out. (See my previous blog). When you finally get frustrated enough to call for help they always start with . . .  "Oh, it's simple!"   And how about those times when us dinosaurs are trying to do something new on our cell phones.  Who do you go to?  Your grand kids of course.  They know EVERYTHING about our modern technology.  You ask them how to do something and they say, "OH, it's simple!"  

With all this "It's simple" stuff going around I want to know why The Man can not do anything the easy or simple way.  EVERYTHING is a production.  To be honest I don't think I have ever met a man who sees the direct line from A to B.  They always have to immediately go to Red Alert to do anything.  Case in point . . . The Man has a lawn mower that is probably 20 years old.  I think it has NEVER had a new battery because EVERY day when The Man goes out to ride his mower he has to charge the battery to get it started. Sometimes it will hold the charge for a day but if it is let sitting for more then 36 hours it needs charging.  Today I asked The Man why he doesn't just get a new battery. He looked at me as if I had lost my mind. His answer was, "Why would I get a new battery? This one works fine." I know I should have just shut up right then, why I even spoke in the first place I don't know, but I kept going.  I mentioned that he has to keep charging this battery every time he wants to use the mower, wouldn't it be easier to just get a new battery and then it would start right up so he can get going without waiting 3 hours for the old battery to charge. His response, "NO, All "I" have to do is hook it up to the charger".   

Let me stop here and give you the step by step process . . . I have to go down stairs, get the charger, (because he can't reach the basement on his oxygen hose), bring it out side, find the extension cord from where ever he has left it, plug that in inside the house and run the wire out to his mower where he is sitting waiting.  He then has the difficult task of connecting the power cord to the charger and the charger to the mower.  Now he has to wait at least 2 hours for the mower to charge.  So he goes in to take a nap after that exhausting work.  I ask you . . .  wouldn't it be simpler to buy a new freaking battery ????  Or maybe I am missing something here. . .   could he possibly be using this as a ploy to take a nap ??

My favorite story of men not being able to see the simple solution was the time my uncle and father were trying to figure out how to hang a large mirror for Husband and I. I have told this story before but it is such a perfect example.  My dad and uncle had out paper and pencils, drawing sketches of where to add the extra beams to support this mirror. I called a handy man and he put 2 hooks into the wall beams, lifted the mirror and with in minutes the job was done.  I guess that is why some people become handy men while others remain "thinkers".  

A side note to all this is about our new cars.  I LOVE my new car.  Love the keyless entry.  Just push a button and off I go.  EXCEPT . . .  there are so many other features that I have yet to figure out.  The manual for my car is as thick as Websters Dictionary, (a reference that I am sure no one under the age of 60 will understand.). I have yet to sit down to read the darn thing so I have no idea what this car can do. 

What ever it is I am sure "It's Simple"

BETTER THAN A BALL OF STRING

 This is not a post about toys for your pet kitten. It is a story about entertaining your man.

When I was a little kid my mom used to give me a mess of tangled string and ask me to un knot it. I've talked about this before. It was a very creative way of keeping me busy while she was attending to my 2 elderly grandfathers.  I LOVED it !  I could sit for hours working on those knots. 

Now that I find myself living with The Man who has absolutely NO interests outside of hunting and fishing, which he can no longer do, I am at a loss to find ways to keep him preoccupied so I can have some space.  His TV watching is limited to Fox News, the Weather Channel and hunting and fishing shows. He is a clone of my husband with the exception of the hunting and fishing. There is the occasional foray into the show "Cops", (just like husband) but TV is pretty much all the excitement there is in his pitiful life. In the evenings there is the local news and Wheel of Fortune but other than that his life is really quite dull. And when a man's life is dull you know his focus is going to be on the woman in his life. Lucky us !! There are days when I feel like the amoeba on a slide being studied under a microscope.  The Man sits at the kitchen table and watches EVERY MOVE I MAKE .  I have suggested that he participate in the cooking process but he usually declines. It is apparently a lot more fun to just sit and watch and critique. Lucky ME !!!   

Each evening I walk out to the mailbox which is pitifully empty on most days with the exception of our daily newspaper. The Excanaba Press keeps The Mans attention for all of 3 minutes and then he is back to watching me and the TV.  I have several different places to escape to but I feel bad for the poor guy just sitting at that kitchen table day in and day out.

UNTIL . . .  In stepped the U.S. Government !!  Halleluia and Hip Hip Hooray !!  Leave it to the good old U s of A to provide me with hours and hours of freedom.  Now for those of you who think our government is just wonderful and doing a great job let me tell you about their latest brain child for the veterans. 

The Man is a vet.  Served in Viet Nam while in the Marines and then joined the Army 2 years after his discharge from the Marines so that he could fly helicopters for 17 years while serving in Germany and all over the US.  He has put his time in and is now able to "reap" the benefits.  Sadly the Veterans Administration is one of the least efficient branches of our government.  It periodically undergoes "major" changes which usually result in it working even worse than it was. But The Man takes full advantage of their medical and dental programs.  Dental works great because the have a dentist in both the West Palm and Iron Mountain VA hospitals.  It's when we get into the pulmonary and cardiology departments that we have nothing but trouble. There is so much red tape and lack of organization that we have been forced to go into the private sector to get decent medical treatment. But that is all water under the bridge. 

The "Ball of String" that the VA has thrown to the man comes in the form of a computer program. Now if you know a man over the age of 75 you will understand when I say the computer is akin to . . . well, it's about as complicated to The Man as a ball of string full of knots would be. I guarantee you if I gave The Man a ball of string full of knots and asked him to untangle it he would hand it right back or throw it out. Patience is NOT part of this mans nature, (although he does put up with me) And so when the VA told The Man they would no longer accept his travel vouchers on paper but that he now needed to put ALL his information into the computer and send it to them on line I thought The Man was going to explode.  This issue was the cause of 2 weeks worth of huffing and puffing and complaining. He made several phone calls to different departments, we visited the "Travel" office in the VA at lest 4 times and still the answer was the same, "Put it in the computer!"  (Remember the definition of insanity . . . Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome . . . ? ). It was down right embarrassing going into that travel office with The Man. .He would be asking the exact same questions that he asked 2 days ago and the poor kid who worked there gave the same answers that he gave 2 days ago. The kid kept looking at me like, "Lady . . . what is wrong with this guy?" and I kept avoiding eye contact with either of them. 

So now The Man has had to suck it up and use the computer.  BUT . . .  does The Man own a computer? NO !!!!  Of course not.  He has a tablet !!  Not an iPad, an At&T Tablet. This stupid thing is a pain in the arse as far as I am concerned but then I am used to my computer.  The first time we decided to use the VA website I called it up on my computer.  WE finally figured it out, (I furred it out!  The Man hung hovered all the while making STUPID suggestions.)  Once I got the hang of it things went smoothly. EXCEPT . . .  This is the US Government we are dealing with so it takes about 15 minutes EVERY time you log in just to get to your account.  You have to go through step after step to make sure it is really you who wants to access this information. Why anyone would ever want to know how many times The Man went to have his teeth cleaned is beyond me but we MUST be secure !!!  Once you get to your page or Dashboard as the VA likes to call it,  you enter the information but there was no immediate satisfaction. "Under Manual Survey" was the message that appeared EVERY ten minutes that The Man had me checking it. Finally he got so frustrated we had to return to the VA travel office to see the young man AGAIN !!  Only to be told that they are very very backlogged so we needed to be patient.  HA HA HA !!!!  (I did not laugh out loud)

Upon returning home, one hour drive later, The Man asked me to go onto the website and check again.  And this is where I realized I HAD A BALL OF STRING!  I suggested that The Man call up this website on HIS tablet so he could check it when ever he needed, (wanted), to see what was going on.  I got him started and I walked away. 

That was 2 weeks ago.  Now ever time I am feeling claustrophobic I say, "Hey D, Have you checked your travel claims recently?"  And BINGO !!  I'v got at least 2 hours to myself !!  

A FINE LINE

There is a fine line between love and hate. A fine line between "funny" and mean.(Cousin Lu is good at this one. She will say something perfectly awful to me and then say, "I'm just kidding".  Like that helps.) There is a fine line between genius and insane.(I think I'm better at the insane side of that line than the genius) There is a fine line between passing and failing which I really was familiar with in high school! There is also a fine line on my forehead that is getting bigger by the day.. That fine line is morphing into the Grand Canyon with many tributaries cracking open around my eyes and mouth. I do not like those fine lines and I really do wish they would stop appearing. 

Back to the original fine lines that I started to write about.  When I go to my doctor and she has me step on the scale I see the God Awful number that she writes down and think, "Good God! I'm getting fat!". My doctor does not consider me fat.  She says I am obese !!  It's a fine line between the two.  Weight isn't really a good example of fine lines because the stupid charts are compiled by a bunch of skinny little twits sitting at desks in some office. They do not realize what an ugly word obese is.  I think of obese as being a person over 300 pounds.  I am no where near that number so lets find another word please !

The fine line between love and hate is a great example. It is possible to one day wake up and think, "Wow, this man is really special. I love him." and then twenty minutes later after he does any number of really stupid things I am thinking all I want to do is beat him to death with the crock pot.  That is definitely a fine line between things.  

What got me thinking along the "fine line" line was my aching back. If I sit too long my back hurts but if I stand too long my legs hurt. If I read too long my head hurts but if I watch TV too long my eyes hurt. It seems that I have arrived at "THAT AGE" where I must find the fine line between my actions so that I can remain pain free and happy. Not an easy task.  I often reflect on my dad who lived until the ripe old age of 97. I remember him being active up until well into his 90's. He would get up early early in the morning and drive down to the harbor where he would climb onto his small boat and putter around fixing things until it was time for breakfast.  He would then come home, fix himself a healthy meal, putter around the house for a while until lunch time after which he would take a nap. After nap time he would sit at his desk and write his book about his life.  He was always busy and he lived a good long life because of that. 

I am trying to be like my dad but I am having a great deal of trouble finding that fine line between "resting" and sleeping 24 hours a day.  I have not found the fine line between doing a little gardening and digging up trees. I think I am an all or nothing gal. I am needing to fix that !

Yesterday The Man and I were sitting for hours.  Part of the time in the car, part of the time in a doctors office. It totaled up to 6 hours of sitting and I paid for it last night.  My back was aching and my innards were not functioning thanks to all the time spent not moving.  To remedy this situation I went outside and walked out to the mailbox, came around to the back of the house to feed the deer, got a few gallons of water to sprinkle on my plants and then decided I was going to die!  My arms, legs and back were screaming for me to stop.  Soooooo I went inside, showered and laid down on the bed to watch TV. (We have 2 TV's. One in the kitchen which requires me to sit on the hard red Naugahyde chairs, which my aching back would not like, OR go into the bedroom and climb up onto the bed to watch the TV in there. You KNOW which Tv I choose every time.) 

BUT now we have to cross another fine line.  If I climb onto the bed too early in the evening my back will start aching and then I have trouble falling asleep when it is time to turn off the TV. It's like playing Russian roulette with my body.  If I miss the fine line between moving and not moving I will end up in pain for hours to follow. Of course there is always Advil, Tylenol or Bayer Back and Body.  All of these are my very best friends. I try not to play favorites so I will switch from one to another when I am really uncomfortable.  

But again, there is that fine line between becoming a drug addict and just keeping the aches and pains at bay. Good thing I don't have any heavy duty drugs because you see how poorly I am managing my fine lines .

HAPPY 4th OF JULY !!

 I am sitting here in my Happy Place enjoying a most wonderful day.  No big celebrations here, no fireworks, no parades, no barbecue with lots of people.  Just a comfortable lawn chair under the big maple tree in the yard, a cool breeze and lots of sunshine and peace and quiet.  It's the perfect day !

Growing up in NYC we always celebrated the forth of July at home. Our small house was on a tiny piece of property, probably no more than a 50x50 parcel of land on a street filled with other small houses.  We had a couple of pear trees, some grape vines on the one side of the house and current bushes on the other side. Sometimes my Aunt Mary and Uncle George would bring cousins Ann and Raymond over fromWhitestone, Queens and we would have a picnic in the yard, sitting at the old, wooden picnic table that my parents had bought years ago on a trip to Maine. (They would tell the story of bringing the table back with them tied to the roof of the car.  Can you imagine driving today from Maine to NY with a large, heavy picnic table tied to the roof of your car ?  That just would't happen.)

I loved the forth of July !  For weeks before all the neighborhood kids and I would be saving up our allowances in order to go to the candy store to buy caps.  If you are my age you know what caps are. They came in a roll about a half inch wide. The red paper had small dots of gunpowder all along the strip of paper and when you smacked the dots with a rock or hammer they exploded with a "POP". I can still smell the gunpowder when it exploded. I think the smell was better than the actual sound they made. 

 Can you imagine selling gunpowder to kids in this day and age!  The HORROR !!!!  But every kid I knew had caps and none of us ever were burned by them.  They were pretty harmless in spite of the sound of it.  If you were lucky enough to own a cap gun then you had caps year round.  Most of us had cap guns that we played cowboy and Indians with.  The gun opened up so that you could put the roll of caps on a small peg. Then you closed up the gun, threaded the caps out under the hammer so that they shot when you pulled the trigger.  Once again . . .  The HORROR !!!  As far as I know none of us kids ever grew up to be murders. We were kids acting out our fantasies.  (Maybe our kids now a days need to be outside running around more and learning how to play !!)  If you were "shot" during a game you usually spent the next ten minutes arguing with your friends as to whether or not your were "dead". No one ever went home mad. You just came back to life and continued the game.  

At my house I never had "fireworks".  I don't even know if there were fireworks any where to be seen.  It was all about sparklers if you were lucky enough to have them.  When we first moved to Queens Village my dad was working for the Long Island Rail Road in Jamaica, Queens..  He worked in the rail yard fixing the radio and speaker systems in the railroad cars.  Working in a rail yard had it's perks in that every year he brought home A flare, (just one), to light in the driveway when it got dark.  He would spend all day making a holder for the flare so that it would be safe. I remember sitting on our front stoop with my mother and grand father watching my dad set up the flare in the driveway. I knew I had to stay far away from the fire because it was "dangerous".  To a little kid this was very exciting !!! The neighborhood kids would all come and stand outside our fence to watch the "lighting of the flare" !  It was big time excitement for us city kids. 

I think my first fireworks show was in Augusta, Maine when I was a kid.  My dad had taken me to Maine  to visit his friends Forrest and Ann and they took us to the state capital building for the 4th of July celebration.  I remember how loud and bright the fireworks were and I remember I did not like them one bit !!  So much for that big excitement. I have come to appreciate fireworks but only from a distance. I still don't like the noise!

But today there is no loud noise.  Only the sound of the wind blowing through the trees and the squawking of the crows. No sounds of traffic or people. It is a wonderful place to be to appreciate this amazing country we are blessed to live in.  

ONE O'CLOCK

 Once again I have failed to comprehend the male mind. I just don't think like men do so I have continue to have difficulty communicating with the opposite sex. 

 MY brain is like a bubbling vat of lava, constantly motion and usually heated to the boiling point and beyond. The Man's brain is like a single ice cube sitting alone in the frozen tundra of Siberia.  WE are at two VERY opposite ends of the thought process. 

Case in point . . . I wake up this morning, check the weather on my phone, (Just for shits and giggles because they are never right), get dressed in what I hope will be appropriate clothes for the days weather, make the bed, empty my c pap machine water tank, put away some clothes that I had left out last night, plug in the computer and my phone and then wander into the kitchen.  As usual The Man is seated at the kitchen table, TV on and phone within reach.  Because the phone is on the table I know he has been talking to someone because most times he has no idea where his phone is. I say good morning and we discuss the weather. I tell him that my weather app says we can expect rain today around 1:00.  This makes him happy because we need rain. I then ask who he has been talking to, and he tells me about the two phone calls that he has made to different doctors. We discuss both of these calls at length and then move on to what I am going to be doing today.  I tell him I have a chiropractor appointment at 11:15 and then I was going into town.  We talked about all the stops I was going to make and why I was making those stops.  He asked me to stop at one place for him so I added that to the list.  With all of that taken care of I am now "free" to go into the bathroom to brush my teeth, wash my face and what ever else is necessary to get me functioning and looking like a human being  (Not an easy task!) 

When I come out of the bathroom I stop at the refrigerator to see what I can munch on for breakfast.  As I am standing in the open door way of the fridge I hear from across the kitchen . . . "ONE O'CLOCK !"        I turn to look at the man with a puzzled look on my face, wondering if perhaps he is on the phone with someone who he is irritated at because the tone of voice is not friendly. As I turn he loudly repeats,  "ONE O'CLOCK!!!!" Even more angrily than the first time. I am still totally puzzled by this outburst but am starting to wonder if perhaps he has had a mini stroke and lost his mind. I'm now staring at him and I ask, "What????" still with a completely confused expression on my face. My answer is, "O N E  O'CLOCK!  ONE O'CLOCK.   ONE O'CLOCK !!!!!!!" which he is yelling at me in a very irritated tone of voice.  

I lost it !!!  This man is sitting there yelling "one o'clock at me from across the room and I haven't got a clue as to what the hell he is talking about!  So I yelled back . . . "WHAT ABOUT ONE O'CLOCK???  YOU KEEP YELLING ONE O'CLOCK AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT!"

His answer,    "The rain !!!  You said the it would start raining at one o'clock !"  

OK . . .  now I don't know about you or any other person on God's green earth but none of any of that made one bit of sense to me.  I don't know what or how I was supposed to respond to any of that. Was he asking if I really did tell him it would rain at 1:00?  Did he think that a magic rain fairy had come hopping through the forest to bop me on the head and turn me into the magic weather fairy who has the power to push a button to make it rain ?   I just don't know what to do at this point so I just walked away.

The Man is NUTS !!!!!   And he is sucking me right down the crazy person whirlpool with him. 

"J U S T"

 Anytime a man starts a sentence with the word "just" you should turn tail and run for the hills.  You can be assured what ever follows that word is not going to be anything good. 

Some of the occasions that My Man uses the word "Just" to start a sentence usually involves him wanting me to do something for him.  Husband was exactly the same so I know this is common to the male population. (My girl friends have noted this phenomenon so I am not alone in this observation.) The Man will say something like, "Just stop and fill the car with gas on your way home from your appointment to have a root canal", or "Just stop at the hardware store on your way to the insane asylum", or "Just drop this off at the post office on your way to your knee replacement surgery". The word "Just" implies that I have nothing better to do than what ever stupid thing he wants done. 

But today's "Just" gave me this idea for a blog. 

The Man's property is large. Part of it is fields and parts of it are wooded. There is a large wooded area between the house and the road with the drive way cutting through these trees. As with any wooded space there are live trees and there are dead trees. It's the evolution of a forest. Trees grow and trees die and the older the forest the more dead trees there are. Several years ago The Man hired a company to come in and cut down much of this dead wood. The neighbors were delighted because it gave all of them a lot of fire wood for years to come. (There was a LOT of wood) It opened up the area so that sunlight could get in and new trees could grow. The Man did good ! 

But that was several years ago and now there are some more dead trees out there just waiting to get blown down. Last winter we had one large tree fall across the driveway and take down the power line to the house.  We were without electricity for 48 hours and the driveway was blocked until some of the neighbors came over with their chain saws. (More free firewood!) It was an inconvenience that sent us into town to stay at a motel because The Man's oxygen concentrator is dependent on electricity. (Tanks of Oxygen don''t last very long.) 

You would think that this event would have The Man on high alert when it comes to dead trees near the driveway.  NOPE!  There is one large tree out near the road that is dead dead dead. The wood peckers LOVE this tree and have made holes in it the size of the Lincoln Tunnel. I know that sucker is coming down the first big wind storm that we get but The Man seems to have no problem with it. Then there is the HUGE, TALL pine tree that is across from the house. The entire top half of the tree is dead. Has been for two years now and is getting worse with each passing year. I can not tell you how many times The Man looks out the bedroom window at that tree and says, "WE really need to get that cut down before it falls on the house", (Not just the house in general but the bedroom. Because if that sucker falls this way, which is where it is leaning, our bedroom is toast).  Besides that disaster waiting to happen there was the small dead tree standing next to the second driveway. It was maybe 15 feet tall and right next to the drive.  For weeks The Man has been saying, (anytime we come in that driveway), "I need to get that cut down before it falls across the driveway" Well guess what?  IT FELL !

This morning I went out to move the car and I saw that during the night the small tree had fallen and it was right across the road. (We have 2 driveways that form a big "U". The UPS man loves this because he can come in the one driveway, cut across next to the house and go out the second driveway. No backing up for him.)  Now driveway #2 is blocked with the fallen tree. (That would be the tree that WE were going to get taken care of, OOPS!)   Because we were on our way out to an appointment we couldn't do anything right then but when we came home it was time for action. Out we went to the downed tree to access the situation. Being the smart woman that I am I let the man go ahead on his lawn mower while I stayed far enough away to keep from saying or doing anything to "upset" you know who. The next thing I know I am being summoned to the scene of the crime. The Man has decided on a course of action . . .  He will sit on his mower and supervise while I move the tree !  (You can only imagine what is going through my mind and the words that I am holding in.) I know full well that I can not move this tree but I'll play the game.  I walk over to the tree, bend down, grasp the trunk and give it a little lift to see just how heavy this sucker really is.  It is at this moment that The Man decides to say, "JUST push it!" (Like I am going to try to lift a tree and carry it across the yard.) I give it a slight tug and realize that it is still attached to the trunk. When it fell it did not completely snap off so there is no way to push, pull or lift it. But there sits The Man saying over and over, "JUST PUSH IT!!!!"  (Right now I am ready to push something and it isn't the tree.) I try to explain to him that the tree is still attached to the trunk but he is not listening. Instead he decides I am useless so he will go get a rope and pull the tree off the driveway.  Off he goes on his mower to the garage where there is a ton of rope.  All sorts of rope. Thick rope, thin rope, heavy rope, white rope, yellow rope and even some orange rope.  There is enough rope out there to hang the entire population of New Jersey.  

Soon I hear the mower coming back toward the tree and sure enough The Man has something orange thrown in the back of his little trailer. I foolishly assume it is the orange rope.  WRONG !!!  The Man has brought back an orange electric extension chord. He gets off his mower, ties one end of the extension chord to his mower, the other end around the tree, climbs back on and starts to pull.  

I swear to you I am not making this up.  The Man pulled the tree off its trunk, across the yard all the way to the fire pit using an electric extension chord !  I had to JUST untie the electric chord. Tomorrow he will go out and cut up the tree.  He will probably use a steak knife for that !

As for me, I JUST couldn't wait to write about all this. 

YES ! OK ! SURE ! UH HUH !!

Daniel Webster compiled the dictionary filled with millions of words. Because he was a man he had a vocabulary consisting of thousands and thousands of words because men use all those words.  Usually they are using them all in one single conversation because a man just CAN NOT get to the point !!!! 

Example; This morning I woke up to find The Man sitting at the kitchen table.  No surprise there. I didn't even get two steps into the kitchen on my way to the bathroom when he announced, "I was talking to Pat,(like I am supposed to know who the hell Pat is), and she said to call her back when you get up and get your computer out because I was telling her about all the trouble we are having, (Not true, I had gotten us up and running on this particular web site), trying to get my VA trip reimbursements and she said that she could help walk us through the whole process as soon as you get up and get your computer working.(A statement that he started this conversation with.). My eyes are not even open yet and I am being assaulted with all this. At least I did have my hearing aids in so I could hear what The Man was saying, (even if I didn't want to), because if I didn't have my ears in I would have to listen to the whole tirade again. 

I, not being a man, responded with the simple four words that are all a woman needs to live with a man . . .    "Uh huh, OK, sure, yes". Those are the only words a man EVER wants to hear from a woman so having learned early on with Husband those are the only words I use when talking to a man.  It is a fact that men just don't care about anything you have to say.  You can be telling them the house is on fire, the kids are all druggies, the dog just attacked your neighbor and you are pregnant with quintuplets and all the man will says is "OK". BUT if HE wants to tell you anything then you better pack a bag with food and water and get yourself comfortable because you will be listening to him for the next 3 days. 

Moving on to this mornings phone call.  I went straight back in to the bedroom to get my computer. I did not go pee, I did not brush my teeth, I did not get dressed because I knew I would be haunted until the man had me make this phone call to the poor inspecting woman at the VA. I did not pass GO, I did not collect two hundred dollars, I did not stop on Boardwalk, I just went back to the bedroom and brought the computer into the kitchen.  I went over and sat next to The Man because I know full well that if I am sitting across the table where he can't see the computer screen he will be correcting and instructing me the whole time.  As I walked into the kitchen I told him I was going to sit next to him so he could see the screen and follow along. Naturally he asked why that was necessary. I explained that HE needed to know how to do this in case anything ever happened to me.  His answer, "But I don't have a computer". I see his simple minded logic here but REALLY !!!  So apparently if I drop dead tomorrow The Man will just have to stop living because he can not do ANYTHING on his own. Who knew I was so valuable ??

OK . . .  The Man places the call and Pat answers. From the tone of her voice I could tell she knew what she was in for. ( I can NOT imaging any woman working for the Veterans Association. Having to deal with mostly men over the age of forty it is a challenge.  I would hope that the young veterans are a bit more on the ball.)  The Man begins his conversation with, " Hello, this is (insert name here). I'm calling about what we talked about this morning so you can walk us through the process on the computer so that I can get reimbursed . . . . . . on and on and on . . . ." After listening to him fumbling around telling this poor woman why he called I interrupted him to say I was there with the computer and was now on such and such a page.  I proceeded to move from screen to screen, telling Pat what I was doing, until we got where we needed to be.  All the while Pat is saying, "Yes, OK, Sure, Uh huh".   You see, I knew we had done everything right last week when The Man had me set this up for him but because he did not receive an answer from the VA OVER THE WEEKEND, WHEN THEIR OFFICES ARE CLOSED) He had to make sure we,(I), had done this right.  

Here's the thing with this man, he needs to control it all. I am a control freak but I also know when to shut up. If The Man wants something done and he needs my help, (like with EVERYTHING!) he is going to supervise my every step. And that is where the female vocabulary comes in. Yes, OK, sure, uh huh. What drives me nuts is that he does NOT know how to navigate these web sites. I am far from genius on the computer but I do know how to figure out most things. Of course the VA website, being set up by our government, is a tangled, confusing, complicated mess. This being said I did manage to navigate it and accomplish the task that The Man needed done.  

We had done all this last Wednesday.  On Wednesday night The Man asked me to check the website to see if what we had done had gone through. (Actually a valid request considering the internet up here.) The information was indeed posted and the comment said, "Undergoing manual review". I take this to mean that who ever is sitting in their dark, dank windowless hole in the wall in the bowels of the VA building is now looking at The Man's request and taking it under consideration.  I also know that this being a government agency it will take that lone person WEEKS to do anything. The Man does not think this way.  He envisions 500 enthusiastic workers just waiting for HIS request to come in so that they can all start working on his concerns immediately because HE is the only person on this earth who needs attention. 

On Thursday afternoon I had to check on this for him.  Same message as Wednesday.  We checked again on Friday . . .  TWICE . . .  Same message.   When The Man heard nothing OVER THE WEEKEND, (Government agencies do NOT work on weekends!) he immediately assumed that I did not put in his claim properly so he called poor unsuspecting Pat at 9:00 AM this Monday morning. I could tell just how delighted Pat was to receive this rambling phone call from some old guy who has the patience of a gnat. All her responses were, "Yes, OK, Sure, Uh Huh".

I sure hope Pat had a good weekend and wasn't hung over.