So.

Last night my brother-in-Law (J-spot by reference) pointed me to a humerous page in my wife's Blog (Electric Grandmother by name). The humour of the entry was pleasant, and dealt with a homey detail of earlier in the day. Far more concerning to me was the sudden knowledge that my wife had a blog that I was unaware of, and had had one for over a year now. As I started to read, he hurridly called the house to beg forgiveness from my wife because he "thought he had done a bad thing."

When confronted, she allowed as to how we keep having this discussion. She'll admit to the travesty of public journal-keeping, I'll say something like "Oh, you have a blog?" and then some period of time down the line she'll have the pleasure of having the whole conversation again.

I had no ready answer for that.

Well, that's not exactly fully true. I most likely did have a ready answer for that, but it was something stupid like "Nuh-uh" and a troubled frown. Nowhere near useful enough to fling as a literary retort to the accusations that alzheimers disease is settling in early.

I think I would remember a confession of something this revolutionary. Blogs, in my mind, have always been about teenagers with lots of free time playing a game of "Greater angst than thee" with each other. This isn't what I read in her blog, however. I found the unexpected. Which is obvious. If you go searching and aren't searching for anything in particular and you find something, it's unexpected. It's just common sense.

But what I found intrigued me. Some deep thoughts. Memories of friends long gone. Pleasant ruminations about me and our marriage. This wasn't the teenage game I had presumed.

In hindsight, the only thing I can figure is she slipped her blog confessions into times where she knew I either wasn't paying attention or was otherwise distracted. I can imagine her leaning over my sleeping form and whispering "I have a blog" into my ear, prompting a poorly understood restless night's sleep. Perhaps she would inject it in conversations where it didn't belong, suspecting that I (innocently) wasn't offering all of my attention to the discussion.

"And so I think the slipstream value of War and Peace in relation to Dostoyevsky's post-modern grocery lists I have a blog could be viewed as so much Post-Modern Pabblegum."

"Mmmm." I would reply, my subconcious mind waking up enough to offer an ignored "Wait, what?"

So, anyway, the only meaningful retort I could muster was to start my own blog, and get over a years worth of posts and feedback before letting her know of it's existence. Deep down, I know this excercise will prove a failure. I'm come to her stomping ground now, and I feel certain that she is sure to detect me like a rat can detect falling gas prices. But I sally forth (Or really Maggie forth in this case) with hope. If she finds me, fine, but please don't tell her. It'll ruin the surprise.

Now. Some important things about myself.

1. I am not a grandfather.
2. My name isn't really Rice

Both of these things are creations of my dear wife's imagination, and to avoid confusion or misdirection I must match her idiom. Blame Bradbury.

I can offer the following:

1. Wholesale abuse of capital letters (I like them).
2. A complete lack of regular updates.
3. Lots of extra words
4. Grit.

Grit is probably not a concept many of you are familiar with. To most of you (And to me as well), grit is a lost idea from a bygone age. Cowboys had grit (Particularly in movies). Grit is what they had before they started getting Edge. Before things were Edgy, they were Gritty. I remember reading Pat McManus implying that grit (among other things) was the ability to pass off any pain or indignity with nothing then a dusty humerous comment (Which often times must be prepared in advance). It is endurance under load. It's when the chips are down and you get to see what you're made of. McManus also implied (AIR) that in his youth he had been accused of needing more grit enough times that he wondered if there was some kind of grit-vitamin he could take to correct his obvious deficiency.

When I say I offer grit, one of the things I mean that occasionally intend to shine the light of harsh realism on my wife's writings. I will be adding details that she left out to make for a more pleasing narrative. I will be holding up rough spots that she has carefully sanded down.

For instance, in this entry, we're led to believe that a beautiful woman travelling with her husband sans 3-year old (Av, I refuse to call him Avadore because I'm male. Shortening names is genetic) in a nicely lavish hotel room has nothing worth reporting between "Arrived at Hotel" and "Eventually went to bed very late". Well, I'm here to burst your bubble of innocence, my friends. I can report with all honesty that the following took place between those two innocuous bullet points:

1. I started recharging all of my electronics so they'd be ready for the next day.
2. I ate some rice-flour chocolate chip cookies and shared with no one.
3. We probably changed clothes
4. She may have read something

Pulling no punches here, my friends.

In other news, the cat has decided that I'm boring.

In other other news, this is a wonderful gift for all of your friends that you think are a little backwards.