Yes, folks, it looks like 16+ years of marriage to me has finally driven my wife insane. If she’s not completely batty, she’s well on her way…
Last Thursday, my wife took the final exams for her latest phase of school. She, my daughter, and I were enjoying some ice cream in the kitchen that night, when she said she had forgotten to bring something important to school that evening. Her instructor gave out bonus pins throughout the phase, and these pins were worth an extra point on any test; my wife had collected four such pins, and forgot to bring them to the final. “Darn,” she said, “those four points could have meant the difference between a 92 and a 100.” My daughter burst out laughing, but I was a bit more tactful.
On Saturday, my wife needed to call a local shop to see whether a special order she had placed was in yet. She called the number on the receipt the shop had given her, and the number was busy. She called this number 5 more times in the next 30 minutes, and every time the line was busy. Finally, in exasperation, she gave me the receipt and asked me to call them while she did her hair. “Um, honey, this number is our phone number.”
I’m wondering what the visting hours at the local looney bin are…
RalfCoder, since I’m not yet 42, I don’t think it’s possible for me to be your father. And to the best of my knowledge, all the children I have sired reside with me in Reno. Besides, I have a full head of very gray hair, so if you’re in the throes of male pattern baldness, you’re no son of mine
Thank you, everyone else, for your suggestions. Horseflesh, you have a really cruel sense of humor…I like that in a person. But I didn’t hide the pins from her, nor did I know of them before Thursday evening. That’s my story, at least, and I’m sticking to it.
Zebra, I think she was throwing out 92 as a hypothetical score, and scout1222 is correct in assuming it wasn’t in Math. She was taking classes in Anatomy, Medical Terminology, Medical Office Procedures, and an overview of Medical Law.
I’m attributing her mental lapses to stress, and am doing my best to resist teasing her about them. If it weren’t for this board, I think I would explode from not being able to tell about the incidents
It would be difficult, since I’m 46. Unless… you’re using some sort of inverse anti-spin retro math, which takes advantage of the Bose-Einstein Condensate to de-age yourself.
Oh, sure, there’s that time machine possibility - but why take the easy way out?
I think you’re presupposing that having an insane spouse is a bad thing.
Suppose she just goes charmingly eccentric? You know, acts all English and plants roses in a desert or something? That’s the type of behavior they make heartwarming Lifetime movies about.
As long as she doesn’t go for the knives I’d say let her run with her looniness. It should add to the entertainment factor in your marriage, right?
This morning when the alarm went off I woke up and realized that my wife was sitting on the edge of the bed. This in itself was not unusual (it sometimes takes her a while to get her legs working enough to stand up), but then she said something too quietly for me to hear and when I asked her to repeat it she said “I wasn’t talking to you.” I got out of bed to go to the bathroom, and when I got back she was still sitting there. I reached for the light switch and warned her that I was going to turn on the light and she shouted, “No, don’t. I’m naked.” I made some joking remark about having seen her naked before and survived, then realized that she had pulled on a pair of pants and was trying to wrap the sheet around herself. I asked her what was the matter and she said something about everybody watching her.
It turned out that she had been dreaming about going out to a show but had forgotten to get dressed first, and had started getting dressed in her sleep. I made sure she was awake, kidded her about approaching senility, then wished her a happy 19th anniversary.
It is well known (among graduate students) that any person who starts taking classes again over the age of 35 will experience the onset of “early Alzheimer’s”. Not to worry, this condition is not the same as the real Alzheimer’s disease.
“early Alzheimer’s” (or school-related loss of brain function) is a well known condition which responds well to sleep and having someone else cook dinner and do the laundry. It usually clears up shortly after the end of the semester, but may recur following exposure to additional school work.
-Katrina, PhC
(PhC or “Doctoral Candidate” is the same as ABD or ‘all but dissertation.’ Both are ways of saying, “no, I haven’t finished my dissertation yet, dammit, but I’m getting closer.”)
At least she was using all the digits of a phone number. My mom was getting her britches in a twist once about a phone number repeatedly not going through (getting no ring at all), until I pointed out she was dialing the 5-digit zip code.
Interesting…since I’m doing the laundry and kitchen detail, if I stop doing that, her symptoms will abate? I’m not sure how it will help, but I’m willing to experiment
FWIW, she’s not in a semester-based school. Her classes run in 6-week phases which run back-to-back. Every other phase has a one-week break following it. These classes will continue through September, 2003. And, yes, I know just how hard she’s working. But the sooner she finishes her studies, the sooner I become a househusband, so I’ve got strong motivation to make her life outside of school as easy as I can.
