Reason #10,423 my husband drives me crazy

[pegkerr]

My cell phone, as I have mentioned, is on the fritz. Again. The cell phone account is through Rob's name, and T-Mobile will not talk to me if I call about it. They refuse to talk to anyone but Rob.

And Rob is phobic about using the telephone. He would rather have bamboo slivers driven under his fingernails than use the telephone. I don't know why. It makes absolutely no sense.

I hate being without the cell phone. But despite the fact that I have been berating him for days to make this call to T-Mobile to ask what we need to do to get me a working telephone again, he Will. Not. Make. The. Call.

He. Will. Not.

I left the cell phone with him yesterday so he'd have it with him to troubleshoot when he calls T-Mobile. I called him about it yesterday. I called him about it this morning. I called again this afternoon, and I just about started crying with frustration when he told me, yet again, that he has not yet made the call.

"What's your damn problem? Just make the frickin' call."

"Tell me what the symptoms are again."

I almost screamed in frustration. "I told you what the symptoms are. I've been telling you for days. The screen goes blank, and the battery won't hold a charge. The phone. Does. Not. Work."

"Well, I've been trying to charge it again. I want to see if it will take a charge before I call."

I made throttling motions with my hands. "I told you. I've been charging it, but it won't hold a charge. Call T-Mobile."

"Well, we have a spare battery around here, somewhere, don't we? I should find it before I call them."

I know it will take Rob days to find that spare battery, which is lost somewhere in the morass of papers that is his office. His happy excuse to not have to call T-Mobile: "I'm looking for the battery! I can't call until I find it!" My unconscious throttling hand motions increased in tempo and urgency. "What good will that do, when the screen goes blank anyway when it's plugged into the wall and fully charged? Nothing's going to do a damn bit of good UNTIL YOU CALL T-MOBILE."

"But I--" and then the phone went dead. I'm not sure if this was a strategic hang up on Rob's part, to avoid my increasingly shrill haranguing, or whether our home phone number went dead because the internet went down again (we use Vonage, an Internet-based provider). Which the internet keeps doing. And Rob keeps putting up with it because he won't call Comcast. Because that would involve using a telephone.

Tell me something your spouse/partner/dearly beloved does that is totally irrational and stupid that drives you bug-fuck crazy.

Comments

[moony]

Hearing you say bug-fuck makes me giggle, Peg.

[pixelfish.livejournal.com]

I'm somewhere between both of you. I can't go anywhere without my phone, but I HATE to answer it.

Something my beloved does that drives me crazy: Nothing lately. We had some talks about things he did and things I did. But he used to randomly go for walks when he knew I had plans to bring people over to the house. Turns out he was in asocial mode then because of stress reasons, but we talked and now stuff is cool again.

[bluewaterlilies.livejournal.com]

I know - I know - that you didn't ask for advice, but... could Rob go to the T-Mobile store and talk to them there? I've generally found this approach to work. While he's there, maybe he could change the account name to yours, so that you can call next time.

[brigidsblest.livejournal.com]

Mine has a couple of bad habits I detest. He seems (never on purpose) to wait to clip his finger- and toenails until right after I've just vacuumed, then they all go on the carpeted floor.

He eats chips on the couch and never cleans the crumbs off the floor or couch cushions, saying that 'the dog will get them'. The dog has better things to do than go snuffling around for sand-grain-sized chip crumbs, but it nevertheless annoys the hell out of me when I walk on them, not knowing they're there.

[blpurdom.livejournal.com]

We've been having problems with water pooling just outside the tub, at the point just below where the shower curtain is pulled against the wall with the showerhead, and I've been unable to understand how this happens, since it never does when Rachel or I take showers, only when Ben and Chris do, but not EVERY time that Ben does. We now need to fix the caulking around the tiles there because the water has eroded it and we have a chronic leak in the ceiling of the dining room, just below the bathroom, which is pretty infuriating, because we paid $600 to have the dining room ceiling fixed and now it looks like crap from the leak.

So this morning, Chris tells me that Ben isn't imagining things and he had the same problem with water getting out of the tub area despite the shower curtain being positioned correctly.

"But that should be impossible, unless you've got the showerhead positioned to aim the water back at the wall..." I thought for a moment and a bunch of related thoughts sort of thunked into place. "Okay--wait a minute. Do you push the showerhead STRAIGHT DOWN when you're showering instead of positioning it up, so that it's aiming the water toward the other end of the tub?"

"Of course."

"What do you mean, 'of course'? Are you telling me that when you're in the shower YOU'RE AVOIDING GETTING WET?"

Which, it turns out, he IS.

:headthud:

This has led to enormous water-damage to our house, paying for a ceiling repair job that was almost immediately negated by more leaking water AND, at one point, a mushroom was growing from the spot between the tiles that was getting most of the water from the shower. And it turns out that the water was only getting out when Ben took showers if Chris had taken one before him and Ben didn't fix the direction of the showerhead, leaving it as his father had it, so that the water would run right out of the tub area, onto the floor and through it, straight down to the dining room.

All because my husband doesn't seem to understand that the basic POINT of taking a shower is TO GET WET.

I was too tired at 6:30 am, when I learned about why we've had all of the water-damage, to throw a fit, but now I'm feeling pretty damn frustrated and WTF about his showering "philosophy".

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Uh...how does he get clean if he doesn't get wet? You probably would have noticed it if he hadn't washed himself for several years...

[mlion.livejournal.com]

Mine is a good story teller, but he always has to put in extraneous details (like figuring out what year in the middle of a good story) that drive me wonky. Turns out he's fixing what year it happened so he remembers it, but I frankly don't give a shit what year it was, or what car his grandmother had at the time.
Gr.
He also cuts his toenails in the living room and leaves them on the carpet. We've had a talk about that one.

[aeditimi.livejournal.com]

ditto on the effing toenails.

For I will consider my spouses, or, with two you get gin and tonic.

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

He leaves the oven on.
He leaves the butter out.
In July.
Uncovered.
He leaves the butter out on the stove with the oven on.
In July.
And the cheese right next to it.
When I put the cheese away he says "I wasn't done with that. I'm still hungry".
When I point out that it is dry and curling up he says "oh."

She has no sense of time. Everything is manana, unless it is ayer.[1]

He will not make a decision until he absolutely must. Nothing grieves him more than the sight of an option, unwanted and unloved though it may have been, vanishing over the horizon, never to return.

She can never, ever, just sit down to dinner and be fed. She has to get up and get condiments. Drinks. Chairs. Cushions. All while the food gets cold and death, eternity, and the cook (me) sit glaring.

[1] Yesterday.

[bohemianspirit.livejournal.com]

Ha! Single mother whose son is grown and flown the nest to San Francisco! I don't HAVE anyone at home to drive me bug-fuck crazy!

...because you need someone to hate besides your husband, right now. ;-)

I will admit I empathize with not liking to make phone calls; I tend to be that way myself, unless it's calling to chat with a friend, and even then, I'm sometimes in an "I don't feel like talking to people" mood, so I don't. Rob is an introvert, I'm guessing? A lot of introverts have varying degrees of discomfort, especially with calls that are going to be lengthy and involved in annoying taking-care-of-business crapola. So try not to hate him too much; think of something you hate doing, something that makes your gut clench, something other people think is rather irrational but it doesn't change how you feel. It's like that.

On the practical side, can you possibly get the account in BOTH of your names so that you can be the one to deal with this stuff?

[jeanineers.livejournal.com]

I'm the opposite. I don't mind talking on the phone to accomplish something; business, set up a date with friends, make reservations....

But I HATE just chatting on the phone.

[weaselmom.livejournal.com]

Lie. Pick a trustworthy male friend to star in the role of Rob - somebody who LIKES to talk on the phone. I can't tell you how many times I have been so-and-so's wife, not for the purposes of fraud, but because these customer service policies are both sensible and infuriating at the same time.

S doesn't do any particular thing that is irrational or stupid, but he is unhinged about computer games. If I ever leave him, that will be the cause. I have had to push the power button on a computer to get him to stop playing when we need to leave NOW NOW NOW. And it wasn't a real game - it was a screensaver game. I ask you.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I was also going to suggest a substitute male voice pretending to be Rob.

J never does anything totally irrational and stupid. This is not the same as saying that he does nothing that drives me bug-fuck crazy.

I'll tell you one my older son does, though: leaves his empty pop can on the the kitchen counter, with the recycling bag sitting five feet away, out in the open, where he could simply toss it in from where he's standing. He does this consistently.

[naomikritzer]

Screw a substitute male voice, I was going to suggest that Peg just call and claim to be Rob. The $7/hour customer service rep really truly does not care. I called Comcast and told them I was my grandmother; I do not sound like an 84-year-old woman, but they definitely did not care.

[fairmer.livejournal.com]

And if they do seem to care, you give them the "Oh, are you JUDGING my name?" attitude.

When pretending to be my husband, if the person calls me Daniel, I sigh exasperatedly and say, "DanYEL."

Okay, I've only done it once. But it worked great.

[naomikritzer]

Or, if there's some reason beyond the name they'd know that Robert Ihinger was a guy, you could go with, "are you judging my voice?!?" instead.

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

I'm a phone avoider, too. I can't explain it. I just. HATE. talking to people I can't see. It makes me tense and the anticipation is terrible. Now, you could justly argue that I should just get it over with and skip the anticipatory horror, but the call itself seems so much worse. I know it's irrational. I pride myself on rationality, but. gah. I just HATE the telephone.

I wonder sometimes if it's because I can't hear all that well on the phone, although I don't think I have any significant hearing loss in non-electronic situations.

I don't know. I do, however, understand Rob's aversion. (And your frustruation.)


*stops procrastinating on that call that's waiting*
*dials*

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I do understand Rob's phobia, because I hate to talk on the phone, too, though not nearly to the extent he apparently does. But I can imagine what my dislike intensified to phobia might be like.

Could you make the call, get as far as where they have to talk to Rob, and then he would talk just long enough to tell them it's his wife's phone and she has to explain the problem? Or won't they talk to anyone except him at all?

[porcinea.livejournal.com]

I'm assuming you've already tried your snootiest "this is MRS. Rob speaking". How utterly infuriating!!

Your question is perfectly timed. I broke a blood vessel in my thumb today, whacking my hands on the counter because I Lost My Temper when I discovered wet clothes wadded up on top of the already-full of previously-dried clothes drying rack. 10 years I've been patiently and not-so patiently explaining THE LAWS OF PHYSICS!! to one of the more intelligent men I've known in my life. OMGWTFBBQ!?!?!?

I've almost managed to break him of putting wet clothes into the dirty laundry hamper. *Almost*. But the part where he tries to dry clothes by layering them 8 or 10 deep? ARGH!!!!!!

[trogon.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't say it's irrational and stupid, but it drives me crazy: She starts a load of laundry in the morning, with the intention of putting it in the dryer when she gets home from work. Then she proceeds to forget about it, until one of us goes to start a load a few days later and finds it there, smelling stale in the winter and mildewy in the summer, so we now need to wash the first load again -- sometimes twice -- before we can do the second load.

On the unsolicited and probably unwanted advice front, is there a physical T-Mobile store near you that Rob could take the phone to? I'm asking because I'm the phone-phobic one in our family, and while I hate making phone calls for non-trivial questions I have no problem asking the same in person. (It just occurs to me that the fact that my partner could just lie on the phone and say she's me, in such a situation, may be the only known instance of gay privilege. Heh.)

[whiskeychick.livejournal.com]

my husband is exactly the same way about making telephone calls. We nearly missed the tax deadline because he wouldn't call our accountant back. LOL.

"bug-fuck crazy."

I'm still laughing.

[parsleigh.livejournal.com]

Steve also hates to make these calls. What I have found, though, is sometimes I can make the call, hand the phone over to him, and have him verify who he is and then tell them that they need to talk to me. Often that will work.

[petal-pusher.livejournal.com]

That behavior would drive me insane.
Serenity now! [if you watch SEINFELD}
Transfer the phone to your name.

[eal.livejournal.com]

My husband is known in most parts as P "the guy who will build you a clock to tell you the time." It's insanely frustrating when you need a quick answer to have to listen to all of the history that is possibly related to the question that you've asked, but just as possibly not relevant at the present time.

He also, as demonstrated this weekend, cannot let me get new toys (like an iPod Touch) without playing with it himself. I mean, as in, after I loaded music onto it, the first person to listen to it was NOT ME!!!!! He takes things out of my hands and doesn't give them back.

Oh, and when changing our cell service, also this weekend, he insisted on sitting in the room with me while I was trying to do this. Every time I wasn't talking he would start talking. It's as if the man has never been on a phone before in his life.

And let me just say that typing this has made me feel 1000% better, so thank you for giving us the opportunity to vent in your journal.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

I think right now the thing annoying me the most is that he pays some of our bills online, but doesn't schedule the payment every month, so sometimes it's late. And I have to take our cable bill to work to get reimbursed for our internet connection, and then our team's admin has to see how late he paid our cable bill, and that's totally not the image I prefer to project.

Nevermind that sometimes he pays them REALLY late, and that could affect our credit rating, or, god forbid, my ability to access LJ.

[moodyduck.livejournal.com]

Not my spouse (as I don't have one) but I have a very good friend who often stays with me for short times when he has to drive over to my city for work. Except he often doesn't know if he's really coming until the last minute. Or when he's going to leave. And he knows I absolutely can't stand not being able to plan accordingly--or to at least know that he hasn't been able to decide yet for some reason. Or he'll start driving without telling me when he left so I have no idea when he is going to arrive which could be anywhere from 4 pm to 1 am. And he doesn't have a cell phone. And the thing is he KNOWS that it drives me absolutely insane--yet nothing ever changes.

[annieways.livejournal.com]

We've got T-Mobile, too, and I ran into the same problem trying to contact them because Doug is the account holder. There will be a phone call involved, but Rob can call T-Mobile and authorize you to talk to them and make changes, etc. If he makes that one phone call to T-Mobile, he will never have to call them again.

[shakespearechic.livejournal.com]

Next time Rob calls T-Mobile have him add you as an authorized user (my mom had to do this as the plan is under her name but she has a phone, as does my dad, sister, me and my husband).

Jeremy does some minor things - wanting to get into political debates, etc. during the TV show we ware watching (usually The Daily Show) - which occasionally illustrates his 'how the world is for other people' naiveté (poor boo, he's only 21) - e.g. if we start talking about poor people or different parts of the country that aren't in the same economic situation as Dallas, TX etc.

[aome.livejournal.com]

My husband doesn't ask. It's not one of those macho "Won't ask for directions" things. It just genuinely doesn't occur to him.

"Did you ask if anyone else wanted X before you ate the last ones?" No.

Will: *hangs up phone after talking to twin brother about weekend visit*
Me: When are they coming?
Will: I don't know.
Me: Did you ASK?
Will: No.

Repeat.

He hibernates in the bathroom for up to an hour. WTF? Do your business, come back out again and get other stuff done/socialize/whatever. If you need a repeat visit due to slow-moving bowels, that's fine. But WTF is up with hiding in there on a hard ring seat with your Palm? If you want quiet time there are much more comfortable places to be. He can be up for an hour in the morning and still not have achieved anything, including the dinner dishes, which are supposed to be his responsibility. Sheesh.

Also, I am the only person who ever EVER thinks to pull out a fresh roll of toilet paper or bar of soap or whatever when the old one is nearly out. If I don't do it, it doesn't get done. I am not the only person who lives here. *bangs head*

As a side note, relating to your hair-pulling issue - what does Rob do if someone calls to talk to HIM? (ie he doesn't have to initiate the call) Will he talk then? Could you ask the cell phone people to call him at a time when you know he will be home (or call at work, on his cell, whatever), thus creating a situation where he HAS to work this out? (And can you make the account in your name, the next time you change carriers or contracts?)

[wordswoman.livejournal.com]

My husband insists that it's not worth responding to regular Help Wanted ads, because the good jobs are found through personal networking.

He has no personal network.

[eal.livejournal.com]

Okay, that just made me laugh :).

[laurel]

I can see how that would drive you crazy, but I also understand it from Rob's side-- Kevin and I are both somewhat phone phobic when it comes to this stuff. I can chat on the phone with friends and family easily enough (though I rarely instigate calls with anyone but Kevin and my 'rents), but hate making calls otherwise.

I guess sometimes it does bug me when Kevin won't make a call and I'm really not up to it; I'm sure he could say the same about me.

One thing that has driven me crazy is how he refuses to ask people for rides (he doesn't drive), he'd rather walk home (to S. Minneapolis) from Brooklyn Park or Bloomington or Lake Elmo or St. Paul or someplace than ask friends if he could catch a ride when they're leaving (even friends he knows fairly well and who live near us). (He uses buses a lot, but sometimes when coming home from a party or a con, it's past the hours when buses run in certain areas.)

As for the phone thing, not that you were asking for suggestions, but just in case it proves helpful:

Can the problem be reported on the TMobile website? Some phone carriers will let you do that and have account management stuff online.

Sometime when you're both home, you could make the call and when they say you aren't authorized, you could hand the phone to Rob and have him tell them that he'd like you added to the account as someone who is authorized and then you should be able to deal with the rest of the call and all of them from here on out.

(Though with Verizon, I'd swear my Dad has authorized me for our family plan account 3 times by now and now they're wanting that again and . . . argh.)

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Mine doesn't like using a phone, but at least he will when necessary. (He's gotten better since work forces him to do it a lot.)

We work at the same company and carpool - we only have one car. He has more work than I do and more late meetings, but also has no sense of time at work. I don't like to nag, but neither am I fond of being forced to stay in the office until 7:30 at night, especially when he doesn't tell me he needs to stay late until it's too late for me to take the shuttlebus.

[fairmer.livejournal.com]

He has never once in all the years I've known him hung a damp dishtowel up when there was a speck of counterspace to leave it crumpled in.

We have even played out a whole Buster Keaton movie with me hanging up the towel every time he puts it down and him leaving it in a crumpled ball after wiping something.

[naomikritzer]

We each have a computer in the home office, and sit back to back. A little while ago, he was up here, and I realized that I was getting really hot. We have A/C, thank goodness, but it cools the downstairs more effectively than the upstairs, and we supplement with fans. He had turned the little office fan so that it was pointing straight at HIM, with no air at all blowing on me.

I went downstairs and turned up the A/C.

[splagxna.livejournal.com]

my biggest arrrrrgh-inducer from the spouse is his inability/refusal to tell me if i am doing things that bother him - until such point as he can't take it anymore, and he turns and snaps at me.

more minor issues are his inability to put dirty clothes in the laundry basket (or even to recognize that there IS a laundry basket, let alone three, and don't even try to tell what goes in what), and the fact that the kitchen floor never, ever gets washed. unless i do it. or my mother comes to visit and does it. (and our household chores are divided such that all things kitchen are his job, so....)

[corinnethewise.livejournal.com]

Dan only has a couple things that just drive me nuts, but detailing the plots of comic books is one of them. I get that he likes comic books. I don't mind that he reads them. I don't mind that he buys them. But they are totally his thing. I will go see it when they make a movie version. I don't mind hearing about non-comic books that he is reading. But he just starts going on and on telling me the plots of these comic books. Even if I don't make any interested noises or anything. Even though I am clearly bored and doing something else. (On the plus side he has mostly stopped doing this since I told him that I've stopped listening to him when he does it.) The other thing that bothers me is similar to Rob's. It's not that he won't call people, it's just that he won't communicate with people when only he can communicate with them and it's something that's important and affects both of us. Like the paycheck he hasn't received yet and we need to pay August's rent (as we got a new kitten and used a chunk of our savings to pay for necessary stuff, like vet fees). Or talking to his bank about something. As a result of this, I also get conned into doing any calling/visiting/emailing of things where I am allowed to make changes but he is equally capable of doing. So when I asked him to call our Apartment complex to find out what we needed to do to get our cat approved, he hemmed and hawed, finally made the call and told me that they were not open yet (and didn't leave a message). Then suddenly I was responsible for making the call once they were open. I swear, I am the only one who has called this place at all. And the place in CT. Argh! I don't like talking on the phone either. AT. ALL. I just make myself do it because I enjoy having heat, electricity, internet, a place to live, etc.

[avengangle.livejournal.com]

I love Ben to bits, but he chops his nails in the living room. THE LIVING ROOM.

Also, he used to get up an hour before me just so he could go sleep on the couch for a while. I still don't understand that, but he stopped doing it. I would understand if he wanted to get up, or if he wanted to watch the news or do something, but no, he just snoozes on the couch, which messes his back up more.

[irinaauthor.livejournal.com]

Steve's deal is that, when he washes dishes, he'll go until the dishrack is full. Then, instead of drying them, putting them away, and continuing with the rest of the dirty dishes, he'll say, "Well, the dishrack is full so I must be done." He then wanders away, leaving me to finish the drying, putting away, and the rest of the washing. Drives me insane. He will not understand that the dishwashing is only done when all the dishes are washed. Not when he gets bored. Not when the drainer is full. But when all the dishes have been cleaned. I don't understand why that is such a difficult thing for an intelligent man to grasp, but it makes me so glad that we have a dishwasher in our new apartment.

If I were you, I'd go out and get a new phone in your own name. It can even be one of the free ones you get for continuing your contract or whatever. You don't have to spend any money, but at least then you'll be able to call the company yourself whenever there's a problem. Tell Rob, "Since you're not calling, I'm going to get a new phone in my own name today after work." If he doesn't like it, he'll call.

[aeditimi.livejournal.com]

I complain about him far too often, but still.

He does clip saw off his toenails in the living room. I find them everywhere.

He throws shit away that's perfectly good. Food that's been left over for more than two days. My spice rack. Things to which I had ascribed sentimental value (okay, yes, that's a lot of things, but ask me first).

He doesn't do house work unless I ask. Then, when I get frustrated at him for not doing it, he says I'm not allowed to get angry because I didn't ask. Do I really need to ask you to load the dishwasher? the *counter itself* is bloody well asking you! You're right; I didn't ask you to put your clothes away. I thought the two laundry baskets stacked on your side of the bed were a decent non-verbal clue. Literally, one time: "Why are you yelling at me? I haven't done anything!" pause. pause. eyebrow raise. "Okay, that's not what I meant." Uh-huh. case. point.

bug-fuck crazy.

I'm using that in my everyday conversation now.

[pokeystar.livejournal.com]

He goes about trying to find information or resources in the most roundabout or illogical fashion possible.

Example: Last weekend (right before I left for Portus) he decides he wants to make oatmeal cookies *without* sugar. Instead of calling my father, who is lifelong professional baker (with 45+ years experience) for advice, a call which would've taken 5 minutes tops, as my Dad is not a big phone talker, (and they get along great, so that's not an excuse) my DH went on the internet and randomly looked at websites he'd googled, not getting the answer he wanted and eventually giving up.

Of course, my mother-in-law once told me that when she goes to the library, she starts at the first set of shelves, and then walks around, scanning them all, until she finds what she needs. With a specific topic or interest in mind, not just browsing.


Did I mention that I'm a library tech?

*headdesk*

[mayakda.livejournal.com]

One phone related pet-peeve I have with my spouse is that he will hang up the phone without saying any kind of goodbye. If the conversation sounds like it's over to him, he hangs up. Mind, he only does this to me or the kids. Yeah, it's rude. No, he doesn't care.