Shut the hell up already! Do you have to fill every fucking second with your voice? Good Og! At least he isn’t talking at me, but at a person way more patient than I am right now. It wouldn’t be so bad if he wasn’t a fucking expert at every fucking thing and just knows that his audience wants to hear his opinion on whatever random thing that passes through his head.
Shut up and quit talking so loud that I keep having to turn up theTV to hear what I’m watching in a completely different room.
I love you, I really do, but Shut The Hell UP!
ETA: I guess this should have gone in the mini-rants thread. Sorry, I’m so annoyed I can’t really make good posting decisions.
have a cup of tea, it doesn’t get better with time…
does he sometimes hijack a conversation and pick an argument with himself just to remain emphatically on point? does he follow behind you in the garden trying to take over and telling you why he’s doing what he’s doing -
otoh does he tell a pretty good story even if the details change evry time? never at a loss for words? good at crosswords?
Is he on the phone or something? My husband is well known for following me around the house and generally invading my personal space by standing right at my shoulder as I’m cooking so every time I turn around I bump into him. He also tends to start long, involved, deep conversations with me as I’m either going to bed exhausted or have just picked up a huge basket of laundry and am standing on the top step of the stairs on my way down to the washing machine.
Ah, well. I’ve come to accept those as his just part of his many quirks. If I look at it from a step back, it’s kind of endearing. In the moment, though, it can be irritating as hell.
Anyway you could ask him to keep his voice down or go somewhere else next time? I used to simmer with resentment until I exploded because I was worried that asking him point blank to leave or give me space would hurt his feelings; luckily I got over that. It eliminates a lot of irritation and conflict.
Good luck. If you want revenge, you can always talk about upholstery incessantly or something else you know bores him while he’s trying to take a dump.
I once told my husband that I went to bed with him the first time because it was the only way I could get him to shut up. He thought it was an amusing thing to say.
After 20+ years I have lots of ways to get him to stop - asking him to fold laundry is always certain - he’ll suddenly find something that has to be done in his workshop. Mostly I am interested in what he has to say, but when he starts in on the minutae of his latest armor design or some highly technical helicopter-related thing, he can go on long past my ability to phase him out and think of other things.
To be fair… aw hell, this is the pit, I don’t have to be fair.
I feel bad for my folks. This is the situation they’re in.
After 40 years of work my dad retired and didn’t have a hobby to go to or any friends to hang out with. He wasn’t used to not having anyone to talk to all day.
Mom still worked for a few years after he retired. So she’d come home after being talked at all day at work to dad bursting at the seams waiting for someone to talk to.
Now they are both retired and I think the chit-chatting has gotten more tolerable but he still has no hobbies or friends so he talks to her all day. Thank god they have my toddler niece to talk to most days. They might kill each other otherwise!
Very different than when I was a kid and he worked all day and came home and slept, and didn’t say a word otherwise.
Anyway I can’t imagine how my mom puts up with it and I am glad to see that the OP and others have this very problem and my dad is not a complete freak.
Well, he’s a freak but all these other guys are too!!
My wife doesn’t talk all the time, but she does have a few little quirks:
If she sees me open a book, she seems to regard it as a desperate plea on my part for conversation.
She talks to me when I’m not in the room. Sometimes I’ll be somewhere in the house and notice that she’s talking… and I’ll wonder who she’s talking to… and then I realize it’s me.
(I thank my lucky stars that these are among the worst problems I have with her!)
He needs to have someone be honest with him. I’m lucky to have a brutally honest wife AND a teenage daughter:
“Hey, Dad?”
I pause fascinating story to ask what …
“Just thought you’d want to know that no one cares.”
I take a quick poll, and the assembled multitudes concur.
I reluctantly abort story that would’ve improved everyone’s lives if only they’d listened.
But come to think of it, I MAY have told them the exact same story a year ago…
I swear, I love Mr. Athena dearly, and I think he’s the best guy in the universe, but he does this, too. I’ll be in the middle of doing something, and he’ll come come with some Deep Important Question, then get mad because I’m not giving him my full attention. Dude! Pick a time when I’m not doing anything to ask Deep Important Questions! Or at least give me a few minutes to finish up what I’m doing.
And he has the perfect comeback when I tell him that - he says “I always figure what you’re saying to me is more important that whatever I’m doing, so I stop what I’m doing and listen to you.” It sounds passive-aggressive and self-righteous, but I’ve been with the guy for going on 15 years, and damn if he doesn’t do exactly that, every time.
Personally, I can’t do it. I hate being interrupt-driven, even when I’m doing mundane things. So he gets to be the better man in this case.
That was my question, more or less. While my own marriage has proven surprisingly successful (so far), I recall from a few prior failed relationships that the “can’t bear the sound of the other person’s voice” stage was never a good sign.
