It seemed like such a great idea at the time

I'm coming up on 38 years with my second wife. While we were courting we went everywhere on one English motorcycle or another, she always said that she had a good time, liked being part of the surroundings rather than just passing through them I was 29 the year we were married, a good number of my friends that I used to ride with were being told by their wives to sell their bikes. I set up a verbal pre-nup: no ones tells me when to stop riding, if she ever gets to the point where she can't stand me riding she is welcome to go her separate way, we have never argued the point; I have dropped the idea that, if and when, I can't ride I'll try an Ultra Light...

She complains that I spend too much time at the shop, but never complained when I was working 60 hours weeks and having 7 stents put in my heart; I must be having too much fun??

I do all the cooking around here, so the kitchen is mine. we don't conflict over the Tupperware, but I generally prefer zip-lock bags anyway. The 30 " convection oven is just big enough to get a BMW engine block into; I use the "clean" mode, after a procedure, to clear any residual odors, although I love the smell of hot alloy and burnt oil in the morning...I don't like gear oil smell, however.

I fix the washer the dryer, the vacuum cleaner or any other mechanical marvel that is brutalized. She likes doing the wash; I've tried to bid the work, but she won't give it up. I do the ironing, although I never make the bed. A bed that is made up takes some doing to get in, one that looks like you just got out of it is instantly ready for sleep, too.

My wife has the mechanical skills of a rock, hard to believe. She has two huge cats and a small dog that seem to like me, but will follow her to the end of the earth. Entropy follows my wife everywhere, delta S is always positive around her. I grew up, in part, on a sailboat, if you are not organized you are dead, I fight to keep delta S negative, so to speak.

I'm not sure we qualify as Yin and Yang components, that would be too well defined, but this is one mystery tour that I hope never stops.

My wife came home early one day as I was heating a Norton head in the oven so I could remove the guides.
"That smells nice. What's for dinner?"

"Err, it's a surprise. Go and sit down and leave it to me"
Got away with that one.

hehehe Roadschalor you sure know a lot about my married life state but thank goodness the others ain't in it eh. I ran college chemistry and hospital labs, lived in small trailer and van where sanity is defined by order you impose. Storms, crashes and wives overwhelm logic.

Anyone believes a tale of a wife liking the smell of burnt oil and aluminum?

Last decade been tough on body mind and clothes wife wisely refuses to wash so when jeans too stiff nasty ripped apart for me, use as oil/grease rags then to light brush piles with.

Alma is laughing her guts out. What about winching a Norton up and down into the studio. She says.

to the use of Snoseal and Belstaff Wax: it isnt a better Idea to use the only hairdryer in the house to warm your boots and jacket. Dont ask me, how I know....

My wife is always one step ahead of me. She read my post as part of her ongoing effort to keep tabs on whatever might be festering in my personal planning stage. Prevention is better than repair in her mind. Anyway, I thought that I might be in for another "lecture" after she read my latest post. Something about airing dirty laundry or some such nonsense. I wasn't paying as much attention to her as I was to my various escape routes. Crap, she had all of those blocked. "What about the time that you thought that it would be a good idea to check the oil before we went into Bob's Big Boy to eat dinner." While it's a great idea to keep track of your Norton's oil level it's not a good idea to forget to tighten down the knurled seat retention knobs. While doing my always stylish "The Great Escape" exit my wife and my whole seat stayed stationary while I and my Combat went zooming down the highway. She still had a death grip on the so called safety strap as I sheepishly pulled back into the parking lot. She quickly changed locations of her viselike grip to my throat. Somehow my wife, seat and taillight assembly all were unharmed. You'd think that 45 years would dull their memory.

[QUOTE="eskasteve, post: 360807, member: 4510.... She still had a death grip on the so called safety strap as I sheepishly pulled back into the parking lot. She quickly changed locations of her viselike grip to my throat. Somehow my wife, seat and taillight assembly all were unharmed. You'd think that 45 years would dull their memory.[/QUOTE]

I'm splitting a gut , and my wife who happened to pop into the office doesn't seem to find this thread funny... i think its the double X chromosone

I grew up with Dad rebuilding carbs on the kitchen table (on newspapers). In the summer, the breeze blew through, in the winter, even emptied best we could, some odor. Mum would sputter, but only a little.
I used to bake my paint in the oven.... in an old camper we had. Nobody knew

Treat the wife to a new deep fat frier as the old one is looking a bit grubby. use the old one for boiling up your Linklyfe chain grease and avoid balancing the tin on a camping gaz cooker ( with a 2.5" dia base) you just know it's going to end in tears. Does anybody actually do this anymore?

I have a pretty well equipped shop so I don't have too many problems with unauthorized use of appliances or containers, but I will say that neither of my wives have had as good a sense of style and home décor as me. Can you imagine not wanting a 1965 Harley panhead as wintertime dining room furniture? And what's wrong with used piston ashtrays and lamps made from junk engine cases? Why waste a perfectly good shelf with porcelain knick knacks when it might be better used as a place to display the aftermath of your last engine blowup? I just don't understand women I guess.

You have not been married very long have you.

Tupperware is sacred...go buy your own stainless stuff...less controversy.

The oven? Make no mistake, that is not "our" oven, that is HER oven.

She has no idea how putting mtrcycl parts in the dishwasher will affect it but if you put them there it has to be wrong.

You are allowed to fix home appliances but when it comes to the usage thereof forget it...you...being male, have no clue.
Just ask her.

Lineslinger said:

You have not been married very long have you.

Tupperware is sacred...go buy your own stainless stuff...less controversy.

The oven? Make no mistake, that is not "our" oven, that is HER oven.

She has no idea how putting mtrcycl parts in the dishwasher will affect it but if you put them there it has to be wrong.

You are allowed to fix home appliances but when it comes to the usage thereof forget it...you...being male, have no clue.
Just ask her.

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We've been married almost 44 years and I agree that that is not nearly long enough to get things figured out, especially boundaries. I did make the mistake early on and asked her about just what those boundaries were. For being such a crude and unfeeling lout I discovered yet another of her "appliances" that was now off limits for the next couple of weeks. I haven't asked since. Maybe when I hit 83 years old I might ask again. On second thought, probably not.

Ok so does any this imply we don't always show best decisions on which demanding motorcycle to take home either?

hobot lucked out that wife has her own world wide gem/opal hobby distraction from me and her own ever changing clutter/hording habit. So beside rules and rulers on appliance use, also rules on recycling, even to point of sending foil wrappers to some recycler, which takes a while to fill a big box takes two arms. Our home allows separate clutter concentrations for routine boy girl activity and some comfortable compromises in the commons. Mature disicplined men and women don't bicker much and of course shun motorcycles and boats.

eskasteve said:

I did luck out when I married her or we wouldn't still be together. We married in 1974 and took a two week motorcycle honeymoon. I was on my 1972 Combat Roadster and she was on her '74 RD350. When I bought a new off road desert bike she insisted that she deserved a new DT 125. I couldn't argue with that. In the late 90's she went to work for a large Harley dealer in charge of running the business end. For my 50th birthday she bought me a new Buell XB9R and a track day with an instructor. When I retired in 2005 I got a new race prepped KDX200. So while she definitely "gets" motorcycles she does lack understanding in how guys work. I think it probably has something to do with the fact that she can't stand when she pees. What else could it be?

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get her a SHEE WEE (look it up if you dont know) and then she will feel equal cause she will be able to stand for a pee

Lineslinger said:

Tupperware is sacred...go buy your own stainless stuff...less controversy.
.

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One way I have found of obtaining Tupperware containers from the wifes stash. Pick out the container that you want, fill it with chilli or any other tomato sauce like food and heat it in the microwave oven. It leaves a permanent red tinge that she can't tolerate and I then "rescue" the container from the trash. When dealing with the inevitable lecture that comes with "ruining" a piece of her stuff I just tell her I was trying to not make another dirty dish or pot for here to wash. She never buys that, but I still get the container.

norton73 said:

Fortunately, my wife has her own Norton.

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That's the key!

It is easier and more effective to shoot yourself than to shoot your wife.

LOL I had a friend paint some Chevy valve covers and put them in the oven to bake the finish.
Bad idea.

MikeM said:

LOL I had a friend paint some Chevy valve covers and put them in the oven to bake the finish.
Bad idea.

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My biggest error with the oven occurred because of an old off road event that was held the Sunday after Thanksgiving. We passed it off as a Christmas canned food drive when in fact it was just an excuse to get out of the house after dealing with all of the warm and fuzzy holiday activities. Mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, all of the in-law poisons, nieces, nephews, on and on. Anyway I would put my leather riding boots in the oven set on warm to really get the grease to penetrate. That year I did my foul deed on the Monday just before T-Day. I tried mink oil for the first time as a friend had given it to me for free. Do you have any idea how gross that stuff smells? Let me tell you that there is no way in Hell to hide that stench. My wife smelled it from the garage. She was afraid that the odor would bleed into the turkey. The self cleaning cycle did purge it but the out gassing totally putrefied the whole house. Dinner out and you can bet that it wasn't at Denny's. We get to take this joyous trip down memory lane every year as Thanksgiving approaches. The gentle reminders start about Labor Day and get less friendly the closer we get to the big day.

Onder said:

It is easier and more effective to shoot yourself than to shoot your wife.

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YUP.