Read the BOLD PRINT

Sixteen pages.

That's how many pages were in DH's little package o' divorce papers.

I know it must be a lot to sort through, however, there was only one sentence written in bold type.

That's the one he should have read. Certainly, it was the easiest to see.

Why, oh why, did he not read it?

He must not have.

It said "Respondent also has approximately $XXXXXX in cash in his safe deposit box that he has been trying to launder and conceal in anticipation of divorce."

Surely if he had read it, he would not have stopped at the ATM this morning and taken out even more money.

Sigh...Now I have to wait until this evening for him to get home and have another opportunity to read the stinkin paperwork before I can provide an account of his explosive reaction to finding out that I know.

The First Ho

I don't know what to say.

If DH is going to continue to insist upon being stupid, I am going to have to insist upon being smarter than him.

He's been sneaking around. Very surprising, I know. And he has already demonstrated how oh-so-top-secret he can be in his sneakiness.

The first ho...the one from the lake...the one who broke up his first marriage...she's back.

Now, I'm not supposed to know this. In fact, DH still swears it is not true.

Just like he swears he has no money.

And I'm supposed to be too dumb to figure it out.

Too bad his cell phone contract is in my name. Heck, I even spend 10% of my child support paying his bill. Not because I'm a particularly benevolent person towards adulterous frauds, but because I would like to maintain my high credit rating.

It would probably come as a shock to him to find out that cell phone bills come with a handy call detail section.

When I see an unfamiliar number appearing on the bill with alarming frequency, I would be remiss if I did not call the number to find out to whom it belonged. After all, phone companies do make mistakes.

It is quite possible, I suppose, for them to make over three mistakes per day. Hmph! He never called me three times per day.

You just never know what those silly phone companies will do...

It would probably be no surprise, at this point, should I reveal the owner of that phone number...

That's right. The Lake Ho.

And he still denies it! In fact, he still whines about why I don't want to work things out.

For a lonely husband who's wife left him for no reason...just up and left..., he sure has been keeping busy. I wonder what One Night Stand Chick would have to say about this???

Anyway, he gets his divorce papers tomorrow. I'm just on pins and needles waiting to find out how he reacts when he learns that I know about all the money he's hidden!

One Ho, Two Ho, Red Ho, Blue Ho

Clearly, I am having difficulty putting to words the events of my delightful Fourth of July. After five days of pondering, my thoughts on DHs two Patriotic Hos are still a-jumble in my head. I'll have to set the whole thing aside for a bit until the mess straightens itself out.

Besides, I've had other, more exciting things to think about!

DH has made me a kind and exceedingly generous divorce offer. Really, I had my panties all wadded up in anticipation of a costly and bitter battle over the assets, but it was all for naught.

Had I known he possessed such a soft-hearted and giving streak, I would have never left to begin with. Boy was I wrong!

During his most recent visit, DH offered to keep the house and let me pay half the mortgage.

I know...I was shocked when I heard it too! And here I thought he would try to keep everything for himself.

I blush when I think of how harshly I judged him.

He wants to share the debt!

It's beyond anything I could have hoped for. Wow! I feel all lighthearted and fluffy from the burden that has been lifted from me.

DD and I will have to live in a little cardboard box under the overpass, but at least I'll know I got a fair settlement.

Until I realized...

That house was my birthday gift. And my Valentine's Day gift. And my Anniversary gift. And I'm pretty sure Easter, St. Patrick's Day, and at least one get-well gift were included in that, too.

I specifically recall, the year we bought the house, DH didn't buy me any gifts.

No cards. No dinners. Not even a sweet little nothing whispered in my ear. Heck, he didn't even come home on my birthday.

His excuse - the house was my gift. It was for me. He said so. Honest he did.

I shouldn't have to pay for my own gifts. How tacky would that be?

Ugh! Just when I thought there was progress being made, DH comes along and digs his hole a little bit deeper.

I wonder how much it will cost him for me to discuss this with my attorney?

A Confederacy of Dunces

"When a true genius appears in this world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him."

~Jonathan Swift

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While I do not generally engage in the practice of referring to myself as a "true genius," seriously...look at the smorgasbord of incurable stupidity I am up against.

So please, if you will, indulge me in the opportunity - just this once - to play the role of "true genius."

You will find, I believe, the casting of the other characters (the Confederacy of Dunces), to be quite transparent.

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It would seem that DH does not trust me. Or maybe it is his money that he does not trust. It is hard to tell what goes on in that devious little brain of his - the wheels spinning so fast I can barely keep up.

At any rate, the big money was gone. He may have thought I would stumble upon it if I decided to take a pair of his undies as a memento to his fidelity. I do not know.

To show him how honest I am, I took $5 out of his buckets-o-money, then left him a voicemail telling him I took it and instructing him to deduct it from my monthly check.

Let's wait to see if he hits a new low in pettiness. I wonder if he'll charge me interest?

While poking my nose around - and leaving one poopy diaper in each of his trash cans - I did find strong circumstantial evidence to support his claim of only a one night stand.

See, he had bought the "One Night Stand" sized box of condoms. How could I have ever doubted him? I will have to slap myself on the back of the hand with a ruler as penitence for my disbelief.

I guess he couldn't find a pack of three...or six...or twelve...or twenty-four...or thirty-six...

Anyway...In other news, I have now heard from his two grown DCs about that unfortunate email virus fiasco. They are as skilled at hurling insults as DH is at hiding money.

As you may already know, the alcoholic, three-time high school dropout DC had this to say:

"stop being such a republican nazi"

After three days of weeping over the painful sting inflicted by these hurtful words, I have finally recovered enough emotional fortitude to reprint them.

How could his DC have known that my greatest fear in life was becoming a republican nazi? Right up there with my fear of being abducted by aliens or growing a third eye just below my belly button.

I have also received a response from drug addict DC. This was the more hurtful of the two, as I have always looked to this DC as my moral compass.

"what the hell is this?? You are acting like a child. Did you really think that by checking my father's email, and sending it to everybody was going to change my opinion of my father or YOU and what you are doing to him??? GROW UP.... you are a mother now, act like one"

This DC would know about parental responsibility, for sure, as the proud parent of a drug baby who was taken away by the State.

I will not be responding, as I would have to take a whole bottle of Benedryl every day just to dumb myself down to their level enough to be able to communicate with them.

Do You Want To Know The Truth?

Amen for clarity!

And DH is most clearly full of crap.

I called late last night to remind him to leave me a key to get into the house.

Well, that's why I said I was calling. I actually wanted to wake him up. Just for kicks. Dark circles under the eyes don't do much to promote one's adulterous love affairs.

Out of the blue...I mean, out of the blackness of night, DH asked "Do you want to know the truth?"

No thank you. I've been oh-so-amused pussyfooting around your explosive temper while searching for half-truths and stumbling upon lies.

Why on earth would I care to know the truth?

He told me anyway.

I put on a pretense of having learned to "listen to him" a.k.a. "believe everything he says."

The truth is - and we all know how honest he is - he wasn't having an affair at all.

He had simply selected a female coworker, then established a personal goal of getting her to "come home with him".

That's all.

It's a good thing I "listened to him." Because THAT behavior is SOOOO much less sleazy than the scenario I had imagined.

If only I had known to begin with that it was ONLY a one night stand, I might have given him my blessing. And here, all along, I thought he was doing something immoral.

I'm sooo glad he cleared that up for me!

What a relief! Now I can go back to thinking of him as a committed husband and fine, upstanding man. Whew!

The Musings of an Asshat

After returning from my recent mission to the "marital homestead," I realized - much to my utter surprise - that a page of DH's man-diary had somehow fallen into my diaper bag. I can't even begin to imagine how this happened. I have commented briefly in yellow, however please be free to meditate upon the deeper meaning of his text at your leisure.

I am upset, angry, hurt. Sometimes I feel deceived. From the very beginning of us I was honest and upfront about how I felt about things. You asked me about my childhood, my marriage. I told you about an affair. I asked - told you - to never say anything, but you did (yes, when forced me to take family vacations with your ex-lover and watch you rub suntan lotion on each other).

You acted surprised that I've gotten moody, irritated, angry, or unhappy when I told you this is how I would get if I was put back in the position I was in when I was younger. I did not want to be the main bread winner or worry about my job, about paying the bills (you said you wanted to retire at age 50 and sit on the beach alone and not be bothered, while I supported you). When we got married, you were working and together, we could live cheaper, you pay me $600, which was not even half of the mortgage (I was never told I would have to pay rent to my husband).

I told you how I felt about credit card debt and what I went through before but the first thing you did was get into credit card debt. You said you would be able to pay for the wedding but you put $2000 on a credit card. That made me responsible for half! (You paid for nothing. The wedding was only $8,000, so it's not like I was a big spender.)

I do not like it when you say you tell me you are going to do something and then only do it part way (If you set this to music it could be his theme song, I've heard it so often).

I love you but at some point you are going to have to take some responsibility for what is going on (for sacrificing everything and living in poverty so you could have everything you wanted). What I said in the beginning did not change but what you said did. I've tried to be a good man and I try not to say anything and when I do I am a jerk (How many times did you tell me you hated me and wanted a divorce?).

I don't want to fight with you. I have been through all that. I do not like that "you are an idiot" look you give me. I have always had a problem with you talking to your mother and sister. You do not talk to me that way (I did, but you were too absorbed in something else to hear me). I do not like coming home and tripping over things or not being able to sit down until I move stuff off the couch or out of the way. That has been going on since you have been pregnant (I was on BED REST).

It's not my fault that you do not have money. You made the choice not to have a weekend job and just go to school. It would have been hard for you for a year or two, but you could have done it (I was teaching FULL TIME, going to school, and running an online business!).

You did not listen to me. Did you think that was okay? I tried to tell you. I tried to hint that it was not okay with me. It was not fair to me (Had I listened during my pregnancy, I would be dead and so would DD.) .

I feel I am in the same position as before and I do not see any end in sight (Not for 18 years, anyway). I am turning into Bad Mood [DH] again and I hate that guy (Your therapist calls it Explosive Anger Disorder). The little things bother me now like you not trusting me to watch my own child in the parking lot (You left DC alone inside a running car).

Decent Into Poverty - The Beginning

What a foolish woman I was, hoping to settle this divorce through cost-effective mediation. I should have know that a man as clever as DH would never agree to something so simple. He had to start hiding all the money, so I had to hire an attorney to make sure it is all found. Too bad for DH, as he will end up footing the bill.

As of this day, my legal fees total $990.

Ah, but this is just the beginning...

In contrast, DH has spent over $3,000 on his.