Articles in “Strange Conversations”

ME: Today, I learnt that [Nick] has made our set-up so complicated that I literally cannot watch TV or a DVD unless he’s in the house.
NICK: But it’s actually less complex than before! … It’s just harder to turn the TV on.

This pretty much sums up my relationship:

NICK: You can stop giving your lecture on the word “hippopotamus” now. I’m really just being silly.
ME: And this is how I cope with you being silly. I go into lecture mode.
NICK: See? It calms you down and I learn something.
ME: Calms me down? What do you mean, calms me down?
NICK: Well, you’re obviously quite irritated.
ME: You think this is me being irritated?
NICK: I mean, you’re obviously quite irritated now.
ME: Well, of course I’m bloody well irritated now!

ME: Why is your computer screen yellow?
NICK: It’s a program. It analyses the light in the room and matches your computer screen to it. So you don’t go to bed after staring at the screen for hours and have sore eyes.
ME: How interesting. Of course, now you have a girlfriend, you don’t have to stare at your computer screen for hours before going to bed.
NICK: Yeah!
ME: Of course, you’ve had a girlfriend for eleven years and that’s never occurred to you yet.
NICK: I love you?
ME: Of course you do, sweetheart. Just not as much as you love your computer.
(Pause)
ME: You can deny that any time.
(Pause)
ME: Any time.
(Pause)
ME: Absolutely any time you like.
NICK (turning from the computer): Sorry, were you saying something? I wasn’t paying attention.

Discussing finally watching season three of Slings and Arrows:

ME: But it doesn’t have either Rachel McAdams or Joanne Kelly in it. I need another cute Canadian girl!
NICK: I know exactly how you feel.

ME: I have a headache.
NICK: Do you want to take something for it?
ME: No.
NICK: Do you want to watch Murray Gold play “I Am The Doctor” on his piano on YouTube?
ME: No.
(Pause)
ME: Could you stop tapping the Doctor’s theme out on my arm, please?
NICK: Sorry.

MY FATHER: My first new years’ resolution is to expand my repertoire of menus.
ME: Can you say “repertoire of menus”?
MY FATHER: I just did.
ME: That’s not really the point, though.
MY MOTHER: I don’t think you can.
MY FATHER: It’s just like saying “menu repertoire”.
MY MOTHER: No, it isn’t. You’re using “menu” as an adjective.
ME: When?
MY MOTHER: In “menu repertoire”.
ME: Oh yes.
MY MOTHER: But if you say “repertoire of menus”, you’re using two nouns. It’s repetitive.
MY FATHER: It’s not.
MY MOTHER: Well, it’s a bit clumsy.
ME: I think you mean “recipes”, anyway.
MY FATHER: It doesn’t really matter.
ME: So, in the new year, you’re expanding your repertoire?
MY FATHER: My repertoire of menus, yes.

Watching George Gently with my parents:

MY FATHER: That’s the kiss of death!
ME: Nah.
MY FATHER: It is.
ME: T’isn’t. The kiss of death is on the lips.
MY FATHER: Are you sure?
ME: Every kiss of death I’ve ever seen has been on the lips.
MY FATHER: That kiss of death my old boss gave your mother wasn’t on the lips.
ME: Well, your old boss wasn’t in the Mafia.
MY FATHER: So you reckon the chicken-industry kiss of death is different?
ME: Yeah, the chicken-industry kiss of death is probably on the cheek.

Watching Wallander with my parents:

MY FATHER: So did Svedberg kill himself?
ME: Well, it was a pistol shot from three metres away, so …
MY MOTHER: Unless he had rubber arms.
ME: Or it was a complicated plot to make it look like a suicide. Possibly involving a complex system of counterweights.
MY FATHER: A simple “yes” or “no” would have sufficed.