Man As Child As Rock As...

In a new Man As Child moment, I got told off last night by mrs househusbandnot for being rude to that anonymous commentator who wouldn't shut the (*&^ up about broccoli in his comments to househusbandnot. I survived this stinging ignominy by spending a large part of the evening wandering around the apartment with my hands in pockets, occasionally picking my nose, and doing V signs at mrs househusbandnot when she was not looking in my direction. (I'm grown up like that.)

Actually, mrs househusbandnot has been above the call of duty reasonable this week, because I have been writing this website for her, and calling her every five minutes at the office asking how to spell stuff and asking whether or not she thinks such and such should be incorporated into the site. (It is one of the problems of working on for your lurver. You know you should just get on with it, but you also know that you can pull a favour or two in from the missus by getting advice and guidance without looking like too much of a twat.)

I met a bloke the other night who has been working with/for (depends who you are asking I guess, although his business card was a bit of a give away with his wife's name about an inch and three quarters bigger than his on it) his wife for three years. At first he was quite cheery about it, but after a few drinks - well one - he admitted it was a nightmare and they argued all the time.

Now, I am not expecting to work for mrs househusband much beyond this particular website writing project, but it did get me a bit depressed for this bloke having to go into the office every day and have a bad time with his wife, and visa versa for her too I assume. Surely* if we live and eat and sleep and cuddle together, we should also be able to work together? Or am I missing something here. Do we really all become such tossers the minute we get behind a desk that even our partners can't forgive our behaviour. I can feel a bad Daily Mail article coming on here, but shouldn't we be able to work with our partners better than with anyone else?

*People should only be allowed to use that word when they are really really drunk. It sounds really feeble sober.

But the more I think about it, the more I can't see any harmonious wife/husband or partner/partner working relationships. David Furnish seems quite happy, but I'm guessing that's because they have separate offices, and there is a limit to how much you can argue about...er whatever they do together. Oh no, he is a successful film producer in his own right . Now let me remind myself about his successful films. Oh yeah, Tantrums And Tiaras. (Actually, I met him a while ago before he got so famous, and he was an incredibly nice guy, so I'm just playing to the Friday crowd here David. Honest.) Just about every other female film star seems to be married to a film producer, but I'm assuming that that is just because film producers are the only people who can afford to be married to female film stars. ("Honey, I've bought you a new Mercedes for Xmas." "Oh. I, er, made you this papier mache egg. It opens and everything. Look." It's not happening really is it.)

There is all that behind the scenes stuff about wives or husbands being the 'rock' behind their partner's successes. But I don't buy that either. I just think that they probably aged worse, and no-one wanted to see them at parties anymore. Or they are genuinely a rock and really boring. Or they are just 'rock'ing too and fro from all the scotch they have drunk on those long evenings alone in front of the tv waiting for their partners to get back from the office.

I realise I am boxing myself into a corner here by looking to offend as many different people as possible, but hey it's Friday. And mrs househusbandnot liked the stuff I wrote for her website. (We did actually have a semi-serious conversation about working together once, but all we could agree we wanted to do together was run a wolf sanctuary.) On which note, off to set the world to rights over lunch with Styx. Will report back Monday.

Oh, and anonynmous bloke I was rude to. I know how boring it is trying to get hold of your wife on the phone. So no hard feelings. (Fingers crossed infinity plus one times. Didn't mean it.) hhn (aged 6)