Articles in “Strange Conversations”

Nick attempts to balance a mop handle against a verandah railing only slightly thicker than the handle itself:

ME (after watching fifteen attempts): Why don’t you turn the handle so the thick side is resting against the railing instead of the thin side?
NICK: There!
ME: You are clever.
(Short pause while we watch the mop inevitably slide off and crash down the steps)
NICK: Thanks a lot, Treena!
ME: What did I do?
NICK: You spoke.

ME: I’m not just going to agree blindly with everything you say even though it’s your birthday.
NICK: But . . . but . . . but it’s my birthday! That’s the whole point!
ME: Why?
NICK: It just is.
ME: Why is it the whole point that on your birthday I agree blindly with everything you say?
NICK: Because on my birthday I am king!
ME: You’re holding a toilet brush.
NICK: I know. It’s my holy sceptre.

Late-night, extremely tired conversation:

ME: Stop talking and let me go to sleep. After all, it’s my birthday tomorrow.
NICK: Okay . . . wait! That sounds like something I should have said.
ME: But what’s yours is mine, right?
NICK: Right.
ME: So technically tomorrow is my birthday.
NICK: Yes, that makes perfect sense.

Or, how I learnt about the complexities of gender politics through Monkey (a lesson originally learnt some twenty-five years ago):

ME: Why is Tripitaka leading that mob against the slightly sad puppy monster?
NICK: I don’t know.
ME: But didn’t Tripitaka say that all monsters are in the mind? So why is he at the head of a lynch mob now?
NICK: Well, the thing about Tripitaka is that she’s a bit of a flip-flopper.
ME: But she’s so pretty.

And later, during the end-credit music (the dodgy, late seasons’ credit music, not the awesome, early seasons’ credit music):

ME: This is like a Christmas carol as done by “Tainted Love.”
NICK: Yeah.
ME: No, Soft Cell! Not “Tainted Love,” Soft Cell! Dammit. That would have been much funnier if I’d got the name right.
NICK: But I mentally added the correct value, so it’s all right.

At the tail end of a conversation in which I endeavoured to prove that occasionally swearing at Nick does not make me the worst girlfriend in the world:

ME: So it doesn’t make me evil, like you say it does.
NICK: I never said that!
ME: You implied it.
NICK: When?
ME: Last week.
NICK: Last week?
ME: I think it was Thursday.
NICK: Really?
ME: In the afternoon.
NICK: Seriously? Were we chatting on IM?
ME: . . . Sweetie, I’m just making this up, now.
NICK: Oh.

See, that’s really what makes Nick fun: he’s so intensely gullible.

ME: Honey, don’t store things on the windowsill. (It’s not just nagging: that windowsill also gets full sunlight most of the day.)
NICK: What?
ME: The Ajax.
NICK: Oh. That’s a temporary measure.
ME: They’re all temporary measures.
NICK: It’s the war.
ME: What war?
NICK: The war.
ME: Which war?
NICK: I can’t tell you. It’s a secret war.
ME: A secret war.
NICK: Marvel Secret Wars.
ME: Marvel Secret Wars are the reason why you left the Ajax on the kitchen windowsill?
NICK: Yes.

Poor Nick: he never does get used to the fact that I like to talk about nonsense while he’s trying to go to sleep.

ME: I saw this Facebook group called “I wish a little elf would write my thesis for me.”
NICK: Hmmm?
ME: Yeah, I would have joined that once.
NICK: (Grunt)
ME: But then I saw it had a disclaimer saying it’s not plagiarism if the elf references properly.
NICK: It’s still plagiarism.
ME: I know that! I would have bought it if they’d said that, maybe, it wasn’t plagiarism because supernatural creatures are not subject to mundane laws.
NICK: (Grunt)
ME: But even then I think you’d find it a bit tricky from your perspective.
NICK: (Grunt)
ME: Legally, I mean.
NICK: (Grunt)
ME: It’s like when someone, probably Matt Damon, got Robin Williams to write his thesis in that movie I think I just made up in my head.
NICK: (Grunt)

(Silence)

NICK: Why are you hitting me with that envelope?
ME: I thought we agreed you wouldn’t hide bills from me?
NICK: But I told you about it!
ME: No, you didn’t.
NICK: But I forgot to tell you about it!

There’ll be no trouble getting the article in on time, but this weather is enervating . . .

ME: I was going be to be virtuous today and do some work, but sod that for a game of soldiers.
NICK: It’s too hot for work.
ME: I know, but I don’t think the editor would accept the heat wave as an excuse for late submission.
NICK: No, probably not.
ME: How about this? “I accidentally died, due to the excessive heat. When I was reanimated, it was with the brain of a squirrel, so it took me some time to form new neural pathways.”
NICK: Okay, that’s just weird.
ME: But convincing, no?

Sitting out on the back verandah, panting, and wondering how the rain can actually make it more humid:

ME: I hate Brisbane. I’d love it, but for the weather. Why did I move to Brisbane?
NICK: To meet me. You didn’t know it at the time, but that was why.
ME: . . . It wasn’t worth it.
(Pause)
ME: Maybe I should put that on the blog.
NICK: Okay.
ME: Do you think that my blog is ruining the spontaneity of our relationship?
NICK: Oh, I don’t know. We usually have spontaneous conversations before you post them on the blog.

Nick struggles with a bag of rice:

NICK: You know, where they say “cut here”? It’s about a centimetre above where it would be useful to cut.
ME (still simmering slightly over having to clean a kilogram of lovely pasta off the kitchen floor): That annoys everyone, honey. You’re not unique or special in that.
NICK (very quietly): That annoys me, too.

It never fails: I write a throwaway post to assuage my conscience, complete with adorable dogs, and Nick provides me with far better blogging fodder two minutes later:

NICK: Aaaaaaaah! (Accompanying clattering noises)
ME: What? What the hell just happened?
NICK: I dropped stuff.
ME (wandering out into the kitchen): Well, that happens all the . . . oh.

ME: Well, yes, that is quite the mess. How did you manage that?
NICK: I was trying to get the mortar and pestle, so I can grind these spices.
ME: I would have just used the blender.
NICK: All that fuss and bother, just to do what God invented the mortar and pestle to do.
ME: God invented the mortar and pestle?
NICK: Well, my theology might be shaky, but my intentions were good.

So, I suppose that the fact that I have angel-hair pasta scattered the length and breadth of my kitchen is evidence that someone moves in mysterious ways.

The type of conversation you have when
a. you assume you know your partner too well, and
b. you’ve spent the day alternating between extreme crankiness (because of the heat) and extravagant panic attacks (due to the essay revisions).

ME: I know what you’re thinking right now.
NICK: What’s that?
ME: You’re thinking, ‘Never, ever have children with this woman.’
NICK: Actually, I was thinking I might go and get an Ice Break.

Maybe that’s only funny if you know Nick.

Three strange conversations in a row might be a bit much (even if one was a thinly disguised excuse for yet another picture of a water dragon), but it’s just been one of those days.

NICK: That’s it! I’m gathering up all the tea towels and I’m washing them. They’re all disgusting!
(Note: They’re not. The majority of them are clean and folded in the linen cupboard.)
ME: Good idea. While you’re at it, you can do the foot towels, as well. (Pause) ‘Foot towels’?
NICK: You mean the hand towels?
ME: No, the . . . you know.
NICK: The towels?
ME: No, the . . . thingies. The bath mats!
NICK: Ah. Right.
ME: The bath mats, which from now on shall be known as foot towels.
NICK: It’s as good a name as any.
ME: It’s really not.

Making my own fun while struggling to attract Nick’s attention and ask for a cup of coffee:

ME: Hey, whatsit.
NICK: Hmm?
ME: Yes, you. Who are you?
NICK: Nick.
ME: Really? Wow. I thought that was someone else.
NICK: Nope.
ME: How long have you been Nick?
NICK: Oh, a while now.
ME: More or less than eight years?
NICK: More.
ME: Really? I could have sworn that was another guy. Who was he, then?
NICK: (only vaguely amused look.)
ME (once I managed to stop laughing): . . . Damn. Now I’ve forgotten what I was actually going to ask.
NICK: Yeah, I’m not at all surprised that that happened.

Somehow, Nick always manages to get the last word. I think I may have killed my chances of getting a cup of coffee, though.