Helpful Husband Holiday Hints

Today begins Thanksgiving week, the start of the annual year-end explosion that features alternate bursts of Good Cheer and Good Grief, with the traditional turkey-burdened feast now just a pre-game warmup for the Black Friday official start of festivities.

Although the nation has made significant strides in equality between the sexes, management of the month-long celebration still falls mostly to wives. Since any right-thinking husband should be appalled at that, or at least recognize the opportunity to earn points by volunteering, a few Helpful Husband Holiday Tips are in order:

·        HOLIDAY CLEANING is a chore many wives hate, in part because they don’t approach it with typical male creativity. Three-days-worn T-Shirts are rich in body oils, which husbands rightly know to be the ideal way to both dust and polish the living and dining room tables. Boxer shorts of similar vintage often contain ideal areas for blending over minor dark furniture scratches.

·        Any guest in a position to observe dust bunnies under the bed or sofa is likely to be too drunk to notice, so concentrate efforts in the more visible guest areas, like making certain the beer cooler is immaculate, the bathrooms at least passable and the glassware dusty only on the outside.

·        Vacuuming carpets and washing floors before inviting a couple of dozen folk to eat while trampling upon them makes no sense, but is dear to wifely hearts anyway. A Wet and Dry garage vac works wonders here, as long as it is used while your wife is absent. If you are lucky enough to have a dog, dried stains on both wood floors and carpets can be addressed with a little bit of dribbled chicken broth and a whistle for Rover to do his thing.

·        HOLIDAY SHOPPING for gifts can be made simple if you realize that the recipients are going to return and exchange them in any event. So go ahead and get your teen-age niece a burqua and your grandmother a bikini, as long as you include the gift receipt. Note: Even if an unbiased observer would conclude that your wife looks better in a burqua than a bikini, always get her the bikini – the longest-lived observers of rules are those who know when to ignore them.

·        Those who shop early for their loved  ones always get the best bargains, so plan to begin your shopping by at least 4 pm on Christmas Eve.

·        Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You may indeed be the Golden Rule, but it doesn’t cover getting your wife a new Duck Blind and Decoy set unless she’s skilled with a shotgun, in which case it’s doubly dangerous. Although individual vary, think twice about a pneumatic socket-wrench kits as well.

Finally, when all else seems lost, remember this great phrase, down from the depths of time from Father to Son:

“Honey, isn’t it the thought that counts?”

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