This project of doing everything my wife says seems like it’s been going on forever…and it has only been 30 days. It is somewhat hard to believe that I still have 11 more months of this to go. I have never been so thankful that February is so short (28 days!).

Today the Wife is away again at a retreat for the weekend. This is fresh off the heals of her little trip to Atlanta for a conference. I’ve seen her less than 24 hours this week…and yet, she has given me a whole heck of a lot to do.

The list this week had been relatively light. I commented on my last post how I was “doing nothing.” When the W saw this, I think a little voice inside her brain told her “this is not good.” So like a good and faithful wife, she adjusted, reorganized, circled the wagons (I’m not sure I really know what that means, but people say it a lot), and doled out a new and improved mandate full of fresh “frog projects.” “Frog projects” is her phrase. Without further ado, I give you the project list:

1. Clean up the spare bedroom, especially all the clothes–this one sucks and is like a punch in the gut. That room is not really a spare bedroom, but instead it doubles as my home office and place for me to put all my clothes and other random things. And its a HUGE mess right now. I get why she wants me to clean it up, and I do want to clean it. The problem is right now, I don’t have time to do it. Work stuff is carrying over into the weekend, I have to get all set for Ireland, and manage the animals. I think I can maybe manage the clothes part, but not the rest of it. I hope that suffices. Remember the cartoon where the kid will sweep everything under the rug to make it go away? I’m thinking that’s my plan of attack.
2. Do my laundry and all the towels–OK fine. This one actually helps with #1 above…and I need clean underwear and socks for our trip.
3. Clean the cat’s poo–I take issue with this one. We have a very clear breakdown of chores at our house and cleaning the cat’s poo on the last weekend of the month is 100% her job. I scoop it the other weeks (in addition to cleaning up Ellis’ poo in the back yard) but on the last weekend of the month she really rolls up her sleeves and gives the litter box a thorough cleaning. It’s a nasty mess and one that I am so glad she does. Conveniently she’s away this last weekend of the month, so it got pushed on me. I don’t like it. Because of this I had to make a special run to the grocery store to pick up cat litter as we were out. So braving the 13 degree temperature outside to the cold car I went early this morning. I’ve also had to put off taking a shower yet today because, let’s be honest, this is a nasty job. Truth be told, I was planning on just scooping the litter instead of the full litter box cleaning, but thought better of it for the sake of the dumb cats. Even as I look at the W’s list of “frog projects,” this one “Cat’s poo” is the only one that is underlined…twice.
4. Figure out a loose Ireland itinerary–She emailed me a list of things we/she wants to do. So in the zero free time I have I am supposed to plan an itinerary. I am armed with 2 guidebooks and some advice from some friends…so it should be OK and kind of fun, but I feel a little pressure here to make this a good trip. This might be something I can figure out on the flight over there…but I am sure that will land me in hot water. Plus I do want us to have a good trip. In addition to all the laundry and packing I have to do, plus keeping up with her passport (see earlier post) I have my work cut out for me.
5. Eat all the bananas–Yes, you read that right. Eat all the bananas. The final project to list here is actually the 1st thing on her list and in my opinion, the strangest demand of hers yet. Seeing as we are leaving town for a week there is obviously some food in the house that will go bad and end up trashed if we don’t eat it. The 6 bananas are included in this bunch, but for some reason they are the only food to be named–thankfully. We also have almost 2 loaves of bread which would be unrealistic to try and eat by myself. We really need to do a better job of taking inventory before we go to the grocery store. Anyway, I have been eating bananas a lot since I got this list yesterday. There are still 2 left as of now. They are at the turning brown with spots and lines stage and I think they look like they are somehow getting skinnier, if that’s possible. Either way. I have to choke down 2 more damn bananas and the last one I had was not very pleasing to the palate. Heaven forbid we let 2 bananas go to waste, so I have to eat them. I think I will try to imagine I’m on a show on the Travel Channel, Man vs. Food perhaps, as I take on the challenge of eating 2 quickly browning bananas. Yuk.

So that’s about it. I’ll be away from the computer for about a week, but I am sure I’ll have a lot of great things to share when we get back. Bye.