Caught ya red handed

My husband is a sweet and generous person.  I love him dearly for all the things he does.  Mainly because they are the things I am loathe to do.  Like loading the dishwasher.  Seriously, he does this for me.  Or killing bugs.  Or putting the cat out late at night, because I’m scared to.  But for all the sweet things he does, he has a very sneaky side.  One he claims does not exist.  He will cover up this sneakiness with things like “Oh I forgot” or “I didn’t notice that” and so on.

So occasionally, I will be sneaky myself and set a trap.  This sounds way sinister than it actually is.  It’s really just something that I, the bored housewife, think up from time to time to entertain myself.  Just so I can say, “Aha! I caught you red handed you, sneaky man, you!”

This time, the trap was in the dishwasher.  I had gotten a plate out and noticed a mixing bowl was still crusted with brownie batter.  Which brings up two peeves of mine 1) My husband will jam the dang dishwasher so full nothing gets clean and 2) My dishwasher is brand new and it doesn’t do a great job even when it’s not jammed full.  Anyway, I digress. 

So I know that my husband will ignore this dirty bowl and put it away like that OR leave it in the dishwasher indefinitely, washing it over and over again.  As far as the putting it away dirty thing goes.  We’ve had major rows over this issue before, but he always, ALWAYS claims to have not noticed.  And as far as the washing it over and over again thing goes…well, I hate to say it but he’s a man.  He thinks if he ignores anything long enough, it will just go away.

I left the bowl there and waited for him to unload the dishwasher.  I watched him take that bowl and put it up.  I asked him, “What’s that in that bowl?”  He says, “What bowl?”  I swear to pete.  He has the memory of a goldfish.  I say, “The bowl you just put up.”  He says, “Nothing. I just got it out of the dishwasher.”  Now, if he had looked and said nothing then I would have believed he didn’t know.  I say, “There is too something in there.”  So he grabs it down (a little huffily I might add) and without saying a word, puts it back in the dishwasher.

I didn’t feel it right to gloat, so I kept my mouth shut.  But boy, did I smile.  I guess now my secret is out about the traps I set.  I will have to come up with a new way to entertain myself but maybe I will also stop finding dirty bowls in my cabinet.

Then again, maybe my husband is subscribing to the Shel Silverstein school of dish washing.