My Husband Makes Me Cry

Well...not intentionally, anyway. It's just that sometimes he says certain words or sounds or makes a peculiar face that just makes me cry.

Yeah, I know. The meds stopped working for me a long time ago.

I will now give you the litany of things that usually set me off:

1) Todd is from Virginia. No, that's not it. Haha. But it is part of it. Because he's a Southerner, he knows how to really lay on a Southern accent (stereotypically, of course) when he wants to. Todd is also an actor, by trade. So he doesn't really have a strong accent. Now, he will claim that he doesn't have any accent at all. This is not the case. He does. Just as sure as I have my bizarre Philadelphia accent, he's got a slight Southern one. Well, anyway, he made a stereotypical "hick laughing" sound one day. And he just kept on doing it like 2 seconds longer than I could handle and it made me cry. It sounds something like "hyuck, hycuk" over and over. I lost it. He can never do that in my presence again. I freak out.

2) Meatballs. He cannot say the word "meatballs" more than like twice in a row. And even that's pushing it. Because if he does, it's like saying "Candyman" or something. I don't know. It makes me upset and I cry. Especially since he often puts that heavy Southern accent on it AND accompanies it with those "hyuckl, hyuckl" laughs. I can't take it. Where did this originate? Ok we were playing Trivial Pursuit one day and he got this one question that said: "On the Howdy Doody Show, what did the Flub-A-Dub say when it got angry?" And we didn't know, 'cause Howdy Doody is about 30 years before our time. So the answer was "Meatballs!" Well Todd just took that and ran with it, saying it over and over, really loudly with that exaggerated Southern accent. I cried. And thus it appears on this list.

3) Pancakes. For the same aural reasons as above. However, here's the back-story: There was this movie called Cabin Fever that came out a couple of years ago. It's a horror movie. I don't do horror movies. Period. I just don't like them. In my entire life, I've only managed to sit through 2 horror movies in their entirety: The Blair Witch Project and The Ring. The latter disturbed me so much that I could not be alone in a room with a television for about a week. Anyway, back to Cabin Fever. So because I will NOT go to a theater and see a horror movie, Todd sometimes goes himself or with a friend. So he comes home after seeing Cabin Fever. He didn't like it. He thought it was stupid. This was no surprise to me, knowing that Todd pretty much thinks every movie he's seen in the last 4 years is stupid. So he said that there was this one scene in particular that was the dumbest, lamest thing ever committed to celluloid. He explained the scene, then he started yelling "PANCAKES!" over and over again in THAT voice. You know the one I mean. And I cried. For those of you who are interested, this is that scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qq_2GOoFaXE.

4) A couple of weeks ago I learned that there is yet another thing that sets me off. We stopped to get Middle Eastern food for dinner from this take-out place called Bitar's. (REALLY good food, BTW.) We parked the car and before we got out he said, "Oh, I think we are out of soda. Should we stop somewhere to get some?" And I said, "Well, I don't really need it. Why don't you just get some here so we don't have to make another stop?" And he goes, "No. 'Cause they only have like HYCHUKKHAL, and SHLUCK MALTHLUK brands." And he said this with his eyes wide open and kind of got closer to my face, too. I lost it. I said, "Don't do that ever again; I think I am going to cry!" And I did.

Now what makes matters worse in all these aforementioned instances is that Todd thinks it's hilarious. Not that he does it on purpose just to get a good laugh, because he doesn't. Especially the thing at Bitar's. That was an entirely new neuroses for me. But I guess it's just that it's so freakin' STUPID that I cry. So he laughs hysterically. Like screaming out loud, tears streaming down his face laughing. Then I start both laughing and crying, which is actually pretty painful. You get to a point, very quickly, where you can't breathe. Seriously.

Other stuff that he does that makes me upset:

* sucks on ice cubes, then pretends to choke on them.

* crosses his eyes and pretends that he's having a heart attack or stroke

* drinks water right from the spigot in the kitchen (sometimes just to "clean out" his mouth, thereby spitting it back out after swishing it around). Yes... I know....

* bangs on the coffee table, or throws the controller, or curses at the top of his lungs, or, more likely, a combination of all three of these things when playing a particularly frustrating video game. Do not get me started on the "God of War" incidents of early 2006. Anyway, sometimes it's so intense, loud, and enexpected that I literally, physically jump out of my seat.

Yeah, don't marry an actor.