Stacerella

Joe and I are the yin to the other’s yang for the most part. For example, without even asking (but he does all the time anyway) he will know I’m hot when he’s cold, or I’m freezing when he’s boiling. That just goes without saying. And we even like opposite licorice flavours. He loves his cherry and I love my black, he hates black and I hate cherry flavours.

Tonight we stopped at the store so he could turn off a few computers he had running on his work benches while I stopped into the grocery store for ice cream. Joe loves ice cream, but not every flavour out there, and especially not the ones I would step over my mother for like tiger tail (with, you guessed it, black licorice flavouring). But because I couldn’t recall anything but the ones he doesn’t like, I couldn’t pick out one he would like me to buy for him, so I bought mine and told him he’d have to head over to pick out his own. Guess what he picked? A-up. Some shit with cherries (complete with one pit in the batch so far) that he practically devoured the second we got home.

There are other things that we do and say in opposite to each other that I thought when we first hooked up were a byproduct of our different upbringings in different regions of the province, but now I realise it’s just who we are. And as much as I love Joe, our opposing ways of communicating mean that when I say something one way he won’t understand and correct me, which leads me to become irritated and screech, “That’s what I just said!!” And I’m positive this isn’t a gender issue, either. He really doesn’t speak English the same way I do, but somehow it’s always me who doesn’t do it correctly, or properly, or up to snuff. It’s never him. *rolls eyes* It’s always a problem with me.

Anyway… Some of this oppositeland stuff is cute and we get a kick out of it, but obviously there are times where we don’t mesh our differences well at all, and I end up upset because he talked to me like I’m an ignorant tool. I’m trying not to take it personally but there are times I would like to rip his condescending face off.

Is that wrong??

Joe keeps trying to talk me out of repainting the kitchen. He doesn’t think I know what’s going on here, but I do. This is just like the bedroom paint job all over again. First it’s, “Why do you want to paint in there?” and then it’s, “It’ll cost too much money in paint,” and finally it ends with, “Yeah, I don’t like any of those colours.”

And just like the bedroom reno, I will be forced to head down to the paint store on my own to pick a colour and purchase the paint, and then I will be forced to slap up a few coats while he’s at work, because what’s really going on here isn’t that he’s telling me he doesn’t want me to do it or that I can’t but rather, “Don’t involve me. I don’t any part of more work.”

Hey, that’s okay by me! I’ve told him I would do it start to finish, so I don’t understand why he keeps fighting me on this with his subtle questions that are designed to dissuade me.

On the menu tonight: BBQ’d tandoori fish with homemade ’slaw on the side.

Recipe to follow, ‘natch.