Fellas, this is why intelligence and communication skills should be important to you when you go about selecting a mate. If all you care about is whether she’s nice and pretty, I got nothing but rolleyes for ya when you come around here whining about the crazy, retarded bitch you done married, who can’t be trusted to handle business in a competent manner, who can’t have a routine conversation about mundane issues without getting angry.
And just because I like to say obvious things sometimes: there is no law that says your wife would’ve needed to know that you called.
Sad thing is she ISN’T stupid by any stretch but she sure CAN be at times. And so can I. The difference is when somebody logically explains why I am (or I figure it out on my own from the consequences) I do a :smack:. I don’t double down on the stupidity and start a fight about it.
Maybe I’ll tell some other WTF? phone stories later.
It could be she has an inferiority complex about her intelligence and is sensitive when people correct her. People who are comfortable with themselves and see themselves as smart generally don’t take offense like this.
Could it be that she thinks you view her with contempt?
Right, and the first rule of marriage is to always go along with whatever your wife says and don’t ever challenge her off-the-wall ideas, no matter how polite and non-threatening you might think you can be. And you should never, ever talk with her about the relationship itself.
:rolleyes:
I hope you will be able to enjoy that dynamic over the long term, cuz it’s probably not going to change unless you and she work on it.
Consider talking to her, not particularly about whether it would have been right/wrong to call the mechanic; instead, talk to her about why it would have pissed her off so much if you had chosen to place the call when she would not have done so.
OTOH, if you’re already in a place where you can refer to your wife as a “phone crazy bitch” - even in her absence - then things may already be beyond repair…
That may well be true. But jeezus when you try to be nice, try to avoid the problem in the first place, or try to fix it what the hell is left besides the fighting about it? Particulary when the fighting is the only thing that’s gonna work with her.
Let me tell another phone story. Regarding the car in question again (actually its an SUV we use to haul our horses over the mountains on weekends).
The SUVs lights were coming on now and then for brief periods of time. Now this vehicle has always been a little wonkey when it comes to the check engine light so that wasn’t particularly worrisome. However, some lights that had something to do with the traction control and the transmission were ALSO coming on.
Well, it was about time for an oil change anyway, so she calls and makes an appointment for an “oil change”.
We drop the vehicle off, I wait outside in the other car, and she goes inside for a minute to give them the keys and sign the paperwork. I tell her to tell them its NOT just for an oil change and would they please check the light situation.
She comes out. I ask her if she told them to check the out the warning lights problem. She gets a bit pissed and basically says that they always check them (but she didn’t tell them about it). Okay. Yes they are probably SUPPOSED to but that doesn’t mean they will. I get home and again nicely suggest that we or I should call the place and make sure they actually will check those warning lights. NOT HAPPENING.
We eventually pick up the SUV (and I think this may be a trip where we did the “hey its not ready yet so lets drive over there twice because we can’t use the fucking phone dance”). If not that one, one of the other past car repair trips. Heck, I can’t remember. I honestly try to forget most of this crazy shit but some of it just sticks.
Well, guess what? Nothing on the paperwork indicated that they checked the light situation or knew there was a problem regarding them. And the lights came back on the next day. I said fuck it and have been driving it as is till the next oil change was coming up (and the lights finally came on and stayed on).
Some people have a natural aversion to talking on the phone; add that to the possible feeling of intimidation they may get from talking about a mechanical situation they might not understand and the possibility they may be faced with questions they might not be able to answer, thereby feeling trapped, inferior, and dumb, you have a person who would rather sit and wait with you than be confronted alone.
Look upthread: the OP has indicated that when these situations arise, if he dares to place the call himself, she will breathe fire on him.
This is one of those situations where you might consider asking her why she doesn’t want you to call. Will a fight erupt if you try to discuss that?
If one or both of you can’t even have a calm discussion about how you relate to each other, then this is where marital counseling may be able to help improve things.
billfish, why is she is in charge of car maintenance when you clearly don’t trust her to handle this without second guessing her? I don’t blame her for getting exasperated with you, because you’re nagging her. Since you clearly have more car know-how, you need to volunteer to lead these transactions the next time the need arises if you haven’t been doing so already. I see no evidence in your last post that you have done anything except passively sit kn the sidelines and bitch. In the meantime, she’s making the calls, getting the keys, and signing the paperwork.
And also, you don’t need her permission to make a freaking call. When she says “no, because they always check the light”, that’s when you say okay and let the issue drop. Then you call them yourself. It ain’t like the mechanic is going to rat you out. It’s not like you’re even sneaking because you haven’t promised her you’re not going to call. Just call and be done with it if you care so much.
I wouldn’t call it ‘dumber than shit’, it’s more like ‘more annoying than hell’.
I always call and verify something is ready to be picked up before I leave to get it.
Which saves me the trouble of getting ‘madder than fuck’ that it’s not ready and I just wasted my time, energy and gas to get there.
Since I am terrible at multiquoting let me just address some of the issue folks have brought up.
Yes, she will breath fire on me. No, I don’t need permission to use the phone in general. However I will catch shit if I were to call behind her back and she found out. And I sure a hell will if I do it in front of her.
I can sorta see the logic of “fuck it..I ain’t gonna be bothered to do something I don’t think is necessary” (but IMO in these cases she’s still being retarded). What really puts it over the line is “I ain’t doing it and you sure as hell ain’t either”. WTF? Why do you give a flying fuck if I waste one measely minute of MY time doing something you think doesn’t need to be done?
I am capable of doing the lead work. She won’t LET me most of the time. Hell, I’m capable of doing the actual work for that matter…although as cars and the tools needed to work on them get more sophisticated it becomes a risker proposition as time marches forward and its safer to just let the pro’s do the work. I was a pretty damn good friends and family shade tree mechanic back in the day.
I understand. She may feel you are undermining her; I have the same irrational issues. I do all the kitchen work and laundry in my house, and when my husband lifts a hand to try to help me, I take it as a rebuke that I’m not doing my job right and he’s having to do it for me because I’m such a fuckup. I know I shouldn’t feel that way and should be grateful for his help, but it’s long ingrained.
Think about it for a minute. Hell a second should do.
“Hey Misses Fish, we checked the lights like Mr Fish asked and blah blah blah”.
She’s so irrational about this shit even if they found a real problem that got caught in time and it saved us from buying a 5 thousands dollar transmission or something she would probably still be mad at me for calling behind her back.
I know I shouldn’t feel that way and should be grateful for his help, but it’s long ingrained.