Wives are from Venus, husbands are from ... elsewhere

Here's my favourite new phrase, and one best repeated in my inside voice only: My husband is so annoying. My husband is so annoying. My husband is so annoying.

Out here on the prairies where it’s hot and dusty and there’s not much to do but drive and think, I find myself prone to introspection. Tend to romanticize things. Ponder our great good fortune. Wonder about the big picture, think about politics. My head is swimming in Tragically Hip lyrics – I’ve swapped Ontario’s Bobcageon-style anthems for the David Milgaard story and sundown in the Paris of the prairies – and I can’t help but wonder: would I go insane out here in the middle of February? I start musing aloud, hoping for a little husband-and-wife conversational to-ing and fro-ing while the kids saw logs in the back. Instead, Doog nips that in the bud with a running commentary on … roadworks and earth-moving machines.

“Honey, did you see that? Over there? I used to drive one of those in Perth. My God, they’re AGGRESSIVE machines! Look at that – there must be 100 guys working out here. Holy shit! Bloody amazing. Hey, pull over here and we’ll cook up some beans.’’

Not for the first time do I ponder how two such very different people can co-exist, for the most part, so very happily....