HOH Ticks....

Things that tell me where my HOH is...

Eyebrows:

When I am crossing a line or getting close all I need to do is watch his eyebrows tell me when to back down.  A small arch and I know he is getting annoyed and I should either continue with caution or back away and regroup.  The full arch tells me he is in HOH mode now and things will be talked about which could mean a "discussion" which I would like to avoid.  If his eyebrows are long gone into his hair line...Well let me just head on up to the bedroom and find the paddle for you to save time.  

Stance:

The casual lean has caught me off guard once or twice, so if he is leaning in a doorway with his arms crossed or legs crossed at the ankle and he asks me a leading question.. Oh boy howdy my HOH radar goes off now.  If at anytime his legs widen and his hands end up on his hips or even goes close I am retracting, stepping back or putting my hands up to say.. Sorry, this was obviously a mistake. Unless I have let my temper get the better of me and I end up toe to toe with him and that never ends well...But yet I do it!  (I am shaking my head sighing as I type this, but it is so true.)

Vocal:

The tone of his voice can speak volumes, in that he doesn't get louder but lower when he is switching to HOH mode.  Seriously, the man doesn't raise his voice.  It goes lower and slows down to give me ample opportunity to catch each and every word he is saying.  If "Woman" is how he starts his sentence, I am in trouble... No ifs about it, I am in TROUBLE.  

I have more respect for fish that are caught and placed into a fish bowl for all to watch... My husband and I have been in a fish bowl for the last week as far as our teenagers are concerned.  We know it will pass and things will settle back down, but it has made me stop and watch Alex a bit more closely.   This year we will celebrate our 18th wedding anniversary, have been a couple for 21 years and we basically grew up one block from each other.  So all in all we have been together a long time and so it is unexpected and throws me off when I find something new about him....

I noticed it for the first time on Saturday evening while we were getting ready for bed.  I was running back and forth from the bedroom to the bathroom doing my nightly skin cleansing ritual and turning down the bed and getting the monster settled on his doggie bed.  (This dog will actually come if you call him monster or brat now!! Seriously sad, we should just pick one of those two and go with it..) Alex was trying to have a conversation about our next few weekends as we are going to be super busy and he wanted to get organized.  He doesn't like when I don't give him my full attention and he had been trying to corner me for days to get this conversation started so it was annoying him I was running around multi tasking.  I was turning back around from turning down our bed to head back to the bathroom when I saw his right hand rubbing his leg..  I stopped and asked him if he was alright... Which resulted in a puzzled look from him.

Alex: "I would be better if you would sit still and have a conversation with me and not run around seeing how many things at once you can get done."

Me: "You were just rubbing your leg, does it hurt?"

Alex: "No, my leg doesn't hurt.  But your back side will hurt if you don't settle down and give your husband your full attention."

Needless to say I settled down and gave him my undivided attention for the rest of the night.

Sunday we were at the store getting the grocery shopping done together, which is very unusual.  We don't shop well together at all!  I have a list.... I follow the list, get what is needed and get out.  Simple and fast! Alex likes to pick things up, read the labels and compare ingredients and prices and rethink the need of buying each particular item.  So I split the list in half and hand him one half and took the other myself and headed towards the shopping carts.  I got maybe two steps before he had me and my list in his hands and told me we would be shopping together.  Grrrrrrr.  We made it to the pasta aisle twenty minutes into our shopping expedition (I would have been done and in the check out line at this point) when he tossed the rigatoni noodles into the cart right on top of the bread.  Now I am a type A personality, every thing has a place and every place has its thing.  My shopping cart has zones and these zones keep the groceries in order and in good shape.  So tossing noodle boxes on my bread sent me over the top a little.  (Oh fine it sent me spiraling)  I stopped the cart in the middle of the aisle and started a commentary on zones and guarding bread from roguish men tossing boxes.  Mid sentence I looked up and he was looking at me with one eyebrow cocked and his right hand was rubbing his leg....  That hand rubbing his leg got me back to reality and made me really concerned.  

Me: "Your leg does hurt!  What did you do?"

Alex: "What?"

Me: "You are rubbing your leg again!  I checked last night and didn't see any bruises or anything when did this start?"

Alex: "There is nothing wrong with my leg and you are blocking the aisle."

With that he took the cart and got us moving back along the aisle and told me the roguish man would refrain from tossing more boxes if his spit fire wife would forget zones for the rest of the shopping trip.  What a compromise...  :0)

Sunday evenings we have our weekly reconnection time and while we were settling into bed to start our talk I was playfully tossing the decorative pillows at him to make more room.  He had already started his serious I am HOH and we are going to discuss a few things speech at this point so when his hand went to rubbing his right leg... I had a light bulb moment!  Oh my gosh, he has another HOH tick!!!  I stopped and my eyes got really big and that got his attention.

Alex: "Honey, what is it?"

Me: "It's not your leg that has the problem, it's your hand. I have noticed two days in a row you rubbing your leg and I thought you had hurt it.  But it's not your leg at all it's your right hand!"

Alex: "Yes, my hand and I have conversation about the need to spank you.  You should be happy that I override the tingle in my hand more often than I probably should."

Me: "Your hand tingles because it wants to spank me?"

Alex: "Every day honey... Every day."

He seemed to think that was funny.. I didn't find the humor in it and got a bit huffy with him.  I said something intelligent like... "If you are going to get any new HOH ticks you should let your wife know so she can write them down or watch for them."  That made his eyebrow arch into full on HOH mode and well.. It went down hill from there and I ended up getting a NOT fun spanking.

Last night Alex asked me what I meant by HOH ticks and I explained them to him.  He just shook his head and said it would take him years to right down all the signs that I was in need of his attention.  Grrrrr.  Whatever!