Sure he's smart but...

He really is smart even though he has perfected the "stunned" look.

My husband Paul is a very intelligent man, until it comes to me. Well, he was obviously brilliant when he married me but he has a vulnerable side where I'm concerned. At least 4 times a year I do something insanely stupid where our finances are concerned. Here's a typical phone conversation:

P: "Have you seen any mail from Bank of America?"

Me: "No, we don't have an account there so if I did see something I would probably shred it."

P:"We had our mortgage with them."

Me: "Oh, we paid that off though."

P: "Yes, but after paying it off they send us the title for the house so we need it."

Me: "Oh."

P: "Can you look for it?"

Me: "Now?"

P: "Now would be good."

Me: "I'm watching Ellen right now."

P: "Don't you think finding this document might be more important than watching Ellen?"

Me: "Is that a trick question?"

P: "No, let me know if you find it."

He has a beautiful smile and look at that twinkle in his eye!

2 hours later

P: "Did you find it?"

Me: "No."

P: "Why didn't you call and tell me?"

Me: "You said to let you know if I found it, I didn't so I didn't call."

P: "Ah, OK. Did you find any bills while you were looking at all the piles of mail?"

Me: "Uh...I was looking for the other thing, there might have been bills."

P: "Do you think you should look for them?

Me: "OK. I guess this isn't a trick question either."

1 hour later

P: "Did you find any bills that need to be paid?"

Me: "Yes."

P: "Did you pay them?"

Me: "Uhm...love ya, bye!"

And sometimes he makes mountains out of minuscule molehills.

When you love someone you want them to look their best so naturally if I see something that can easily be fixed I fix it. One day when we were sitting in the car I noticed a gnarly hair sticking out of his ear. I lovingly and gently plucked it from his ear and he cried like a little girl. Well, when I think about it we might have already been driving on the highway at about 75 miles per hour and extracting a hair from his ear might have been a tad surprising.

Looking dapper here - keeping his ear hairs under control helps.

Then there's the allegation that I tried to run over him with the car. Obviously this is an unsubstantiated claim, it's a matter of he said, she said and there were no corroborating witnesses. Granted, I'm not sure exactly how the car ended up in reverse but I tapped him ever so gently and he smiled at me so obviously he was fine. To hear him tell it you would think I hit him with a German Panzer, his mom ran over his dad's foot and he didn't complain. Well, he might have complained a bit. I guess they're both a little soft.

Engagement picture - so young!

A little older

I'm broken. At age 39 I was diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis, Fibromyalgia, and Sjogrens Syndrome. I've suffered with depression for a long time but the RA intensified it. At the time of the diagnosis Paul and I had been married for 13 years. On August 27, 1988 Paul promised to love me in sickness and in health and he's fulfilled that vow even though there's been more sickness than health. He is a man of faith, 'What would Jesus Do' is not a catchphrase to him, it's how he lives his life EVERY SINGLE DAY.

Paul filling in at the pulpit for Community Christian Church

There is a "Love Your Spouse" challenge going around on Facebook where you are supposed to post a picture of you and your spouse for 7 days to show your love. There isn't a single picture (or 7) I could post that could embody the faith and love he exhibits. I'm a lucky woman, I married an amazing man. I wish I could come up with a picture to display it.

FARTS

I hate to be startled. I'm not talking about the kind of startled where you wake up on your birthday and are startled by the fact that you're another year older and you haven't done all the things you had planned to do by this stage in your life. For example: climbing Everest, swimming the English channel, flying solo over the Atlantic, getting all the way through Moulin Rouge so you can try to understand what all the fuss is about. Thankfully you realize that you never wanted to do any of those things and you're relieved momentarily until you grasp the fact that you're another year older and you still haven't cleaned out the junk room (it didn't used to be called the junk room, before it was a bedroom) and then you are completely overcome with the realization that there are actually 3 junk rooms. You also have never finished an entire New York Times Sunday crossword, lost weight, or cleaned any of the other rooms. At this point you've passed startled, you're stunned, astonished, even terrified. I mean terrified like seeing a clown kind of terrified (every time Cameron on 'Modern Family' dresses up as a clown I have to hold someones hand to get through it.) Anyway, I really hate being startled and I will go from  mildly pleasant to raging beast if you startle me on purpose.

On our honeymoon (for our ADP friends we stayed in room 401) one night I was stricken with a bad case of the hiccups. The lights were out and we were trying to sleep. Suddenly, Paul screams and I levitate off the bed so high that I nearly broke my nose on the ceiling. I ran for the phone to see if there was a lawyer with late hours so I could immediately divorce this fiend that I thought would always be good to me. Yes, it cured the hiccups but I stayed awake the rest of the night with a bread knife in my hand just in case the demon shrieked again.

The demon now frightens me by farting frequently. Deafening, startling farts. At night while on the verge of sleep and this happens:

I jump out of bed wondering if it's the emergency air sirens warning of a tornado or maybe a Zombie Apocalypse. Nope, Paul farted.  Five minutes later when my heart rate returns to normal sinus rhythm he's snoring, obviously feeling much better after that booming breaking of wind. Startles me. I hate to be startled, especially by flatulence. I'm giving some thought to upgrading from the butter knife, that boy will be sounding like the Bee Gees some day if he keeps this up.

Ever eaten Beanitos? They're tasty, they have protein, fiber, they're free of GMO's, artificial flavors and colors, corn, MSG, gluten...on and on. As the name suggests, they're made from beans, radioactive beans. Beanito farts are toxic. One day, Amelia and I went to the grocery store and I Beanito farted as we were pulling in to the parking lot. We both were gasping for air so I rolled the windows down to air out the car (the leather was peeling under my butt.) I rolled the windows back up while we were in the store. It was a hot Texas day, 30 minutes later when we opened the car doors we were struck by a putrid, Beanito, level 5, defcon fart, 2 birds on a nearby wire dropped dead and the lady next to us called 911 to report a gas leak. When I explained to her it was a fermented Beanito fart she also asked for the police. Beware the Beanito fart, they don't have a warning label on the bag but consider yourself forewarned.

At this point of the story I'm going to change the names to protect the guilty perpetrators of fart crimes. One late night as our family was checking in to a hotel, one family member, I'll call her Celeste, elevator farted. She thought she'd left it outside the elevator but it followed her anyway. An elevator fart removes all breathable oxygen. Fortunately, the hotel only had 3 floors so we all survived relatively unscathed even though the memory (like a Beanito fart) lingers.

I have a friend I'll call Elizabeth that never allowed her husband Kevin to poot around her (poot is her word for fart.) I don't know if that's still the case, they've been married over 30 years, have 3 kids that have probably pooted a lot so she's probably loosened the poot rules by now. She's also the friend that sings 'Trailers for Rent' in the bathroom when she's drunk, and waves at you under the stalls, or thinks it's you when it's really the waitress. But that's a whole 'nother story!!!!