You know you just can’t win with a woman. No matter what I do, my wife finds fault; take yesterday for instance, I’d just left the pub when I bumped into old Charlie coming out of the betting shop, he was carrying this big bunch of flowers. I asked him who was in hospital and he said ‘no one,’ but his missus gets right upset if he doesn’t buy her a bunch of flowers every Saturday.

So I thinks to myself, I’ll get my missus a bunch, keep her sweet, just last week she was complaining I never bought her any flowers, not since I borrowed money off her to pay for the wedding bouquet! So I buys this big bunch off the fella in the market and goes home, I give them to her and she looks at me queer like and ses "whats this for, what you done wrong this time?"

Then there’s the neighbour over the road, his wife goes out to work and he stays home, a house-husband the wife calls it, she reckons he’s a pansy ‘cos he does all the house work. Then she calls me a chauvinist pig when I wouldn’t wash the dishes, huh, I’d ‘ave been late for the darts match!

She went to visit her sister last week and when she got back she carried on something awful about the brother-in-law, according to her he’s a vain, insensitive bastard and a pervert to boot. Just ‘cos he goes to the gym body building, doesn’t cry over weepy movies and he buys her sister frilly knickers.

Then she has the cheek to call me a slob, just because I popped a shirt button, and when my eyes started watering when we were watching ‘Watership Down’ with the kids, she called me a wimp! Last Christmas she told me I was unromantic ‘cos I never buy her any undies… I don’t think she liked the colour of the electric drill I bought her, well, she is taking woodwork at night school, she muttered something about "might as well learn to do the job myself!"

The new receptionist at work is just as bad, she was in the Accounts office gossiping when I went in to query my overtime, my pay packet was short several quid. She had the cheek to call me greedy ‘cos I’d worked overtime, said I was taking work away from some other poor sod. All she does all day is sit on her backside painting her talons purple and sometimes answers the phone, she can’t even pick up her pen with those nails, anyway she reckons she is being exploited, low pay, boring job etc., ses she oughta have a pay raise, she’s only been there 5 minutes!

Talking of overtime, my wife even complained about that, said I never had enough time for her, she soon went out and spent the extra cash though, and when I told her there wouldn’t be any more overtime for a while she told me I should get off my fat ass and find something that paid better. Can’t win I tell yer!

I asked her one day why she doesn’t shave her hairy legs, boy, all hell let lose, she thumped hell out of me and called me a sexist, and that’s another thing, if I raised a hand to her she’d call it wife-bashing, if she thumps me, that’s self defence!

When it comes to making decisions, boy, if I don’t consult her first I’m a chauvinist, trying to dominate her but she can make them all the time without any help from me ‘cos she’s a ‘liberated woman,’ funny, I never even knew she’d been ‘inside!’

Last night was the last straw, I had a thumping head after a night out with the lads, and then she starts to get amorous. I told her I had a headache and she ses I don’t love her anymore. It was a different story last week when she had a headache, she was ‘tired’ and I was ‘oversexed!’

It’s no wonder we die before the women, I reckon it’s ‘cos we want to!

Jackie S Brooks (c)
4 August 2003