My Panties Are in a Wad

When I left the house at 6:00 AM, it was no closer to being ready for a get together than it was Monday when we were elected to have the family over for a Christmas chili dinner.

Don’t get me wrong, I love having everybody for dinner. But it takes Chinese water torture to get Jimbob to pick up his clutter. Paper of any kind petrifies him. He refuses to throw anything away even if it’s junk mail. Instead we have numerous piles of paper he doesn’t know what to do with scattered about the house.

We have boxes and boxes and boxes of old mail and receipts in the attic that he’s saving for something. I just don’t know what. That’s only a small beginning of things up there that should be discarded. It does no good to tell him it’s a fire hazard.

In addition our garage looks like Sanford and Son’s junk shop. We have 3 saddles, numerous ugly chairs, and art work out the wazoo. AND ZERO CARS!!!!! I like my car in the garage.

And I’m anal about CLUTTER. I figure if you haven’t worn it or used it in the last year, get rid of it. Goodwill and Salvation Army love me. Not only that, I abhor being late and waiting until the last possible moment to leave the house.

Now, back to dinner tonight. As you can imagine by now, the fact that Jimbob has not picked up or put a single thing away even though he knows we are having 16 relatives for dinner tonight IS DRIVING ME CRAZY.

And you’re probably thinking if it doesn’t bother him, why should I get my panties in a wad. If you read my last blog you’ll remember me saying that Jimbob runs around the house stuffing paper into grocery sacks at the last moment.

I also mentioned that he gets rather owlie because the house isn’t perfect. I went home Wednesday and first thing out of his mouth was, “Where is the prescription for my new glasses?” I didn’t have it and that’s what I said. Then he gets pissed at me because he was positive I had it (not). So he’s ranting and raving that he can't get new glasses without the prescription.

Well, you know, pick up the phone and call the optometrist for another copy. DUH!

Same night, different scene. We were due at church for caroling at 6:00 PM and we were late because it took longer than he expected to pick out glasses and all that BS. Caroling did not go as he anticipated and we were not back at church by 7:30 for choir practice. And he hadn’t had dinner yet.

So it was a miserable drive home and a silent dinner at IHOP. Yesterday he called and wanted to go to dinner because we’d had so little time together lately. Damn, he was still crabby. Another wonderful evening shot to hell.

What I haven’t mentioned is our choir is singing for two services Christmas Eve and he doesn’t think we’re prepared. Okay, so add messy house to an unprepared choir and I’m ready to stake him out in the yard with the rest of the dogs until Christmas is over and done for another year.