Putting the Ho into Ho Ho Ho!

I can’t believe that the Harridan is so lacking in common sense, that she would storm the place on Boxing day and demand that the Squeeze, Kid 1 and Kid 2, all front up outside so she can tell them all point blank that ALL COMMUNICATION MUST GO VIA HER.

Yes…  How DARE we invite the Squeeze’s kids to a Boxing day dinner – without organising it via her.   My mistake; but then I didn’t realise...  I mean given that two of them don’t live at home, I just couldn't foresee an issue.  

And what did that achieve..?   I mean other than upsetting everyone – including her own children.

Yes.  What a martyr.  Everything she does is for the kids.  Everything....

Seeking Help

Today we had our usual drama. Christmas number 4 - and that psychotic witch continues to disrupt the world according to normal, rational people.

In short; and the Jewel on the crown is that Harridan is dropping kid 3 off 2.5 hours after the lunch expected time frame/invite and sending bursts of text to the Squeeze to say this is what happens when he doesn't organise via her.  So glad she had the good sense not to cross the threshold...  Although that level of sheer audacity wouldn't have surprised me.

In reply to her abuse via text, I got fed up and replied "you need help".  Short.  Sharp.  Accurate.  To the point.

She replied that she was checking in to a 'facility' come end of January.  Frankly, I don't believe it but it obviously tugged at the Moodle's heart strings who then began an argument with me that I dared to send a reply from his phone - of course I made sure she knew it was from me so I'm not sure what all the fuss was about other than the fact that I called an kettle a kettle.

But once again, I'm the bad guy.   When does this idiot grow some testicles and just tell her that her reality will no longer played to?    Longer than I have to wait I suspect...   Why does she wreck everything; why does she dictate all meetings.  Why does her let her..?

Aren't I the one who just had his whole family to lunch - served at 3 pm due to her ridiculous games of "I don't know what's going on....  We are at Rye..."   Of course we don't want to deal with her; she is a raving nut job and we don't wan't to deal with it... seriously!

I am so sick of being the bad guy...  This woman could set him on fire and I'd be berated because I raised the fire extinguisher and put it out; because she was going to stifle the flames...   I'd ruined it all.

Over it.  Fed up with it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The idiot I live with can live an emasculated life without any joy - but with a shit load of "do this!!! NOW!!!!!"   And I seriously won't care.  His problem.  But all "lunches/days/parties/organisation" is off from this side of the planet!

The insight of comments

I’ve been inundated with contact about my blog today.  Alright, inundated for me is a couple of email, some blog posts and a few texts – but they all amount to the same thing.  WTF is wrong with this woman?

My sister’s comments are my favourite.  It’s all death and doom – “she’s a raving psychopath!  Be careful!”  The less than humorous part of that is that she is spot on.    The Harridan likes to pretend she is a martyr, but truth tell, she’s more likely to set me on fire than to burn herself in protest over monks in some God forsaken country.

My brother’s text comments were funny.  “What the hell is with the spelling…?  What does she teach?  Work shop!” lol

But new friend Anonymous 1 and only friend Anonymous 2 had it right.  Segregate her poison from my blog… This was such an excellent idea I’m most definitely going to do that…  And:   I hope your partner will realize that by continuing to allow her to treat him this way, he or you or the kid will never be able to be happy. You can't while someone controls your life. It's not doing anyone any favors and will be the demise of your relationship. We all must fight for who we love and who love US. Not the ones that wish to destroy us.

How true; those words.  This is a kindred spirit and I don’t even know her name.

The upside is that all has been silent in Harridan land today.  Perhaps the threat to “block” her if she didn’t keep a civil tongue in her head gave her pause.  Either that or she suspects that I am the one that answered her lol

Brooding...

Okay, I haven't exactly been sitting awake all night and brooding about the Harridan, although it is 2.50 am here in Melbourne.  There would be no point.  Besides, I'm more than pleased that the Squeeze actually stood up for himself, albeit, not in the way I would have but maybe his way of quiet grace and civility is better...

Then again, quiet grace could just be over rated.

I'm having a sleepless night where work is spinning around in my head, which turns to finding a new house and how those living arrangements would look.  Then I update my Words With Friends with my sister who is sleepless in another town...  Then I sleep for what feels like 8.4 seconds before I'm awake again.  It's a vicious cycle that escalates stress as the clock tick's forward and the hours until my damned alarm goes off, diminish.

Tonight I tossed and turned a little with the visual turn my blog has taken.  The addition of text messages is most certainly ugly.  I've come from a design background and so anything that doesn't look 'just right', borders on offensive; and these huge lumps of blue and yellow text are down right ugly.  What to do... what to do...  I could ad lib as I have often done in the past, but in some ways, this visual truth of what we deal with has greater impact. As evidence, my sister has sent several emails and texts to say "she is psycho!!!  Be careful!!!!" which I found amusing.  Of course the scary part is that she is correct.

At about 2 am, I checked email and discovered a comment on my blog.  I have no idea if I have a fan base that consists of more than my family and close friends.  I do average a good 100+ hits a night which sometimes astounds me.  If I fell on this website while surfing one night, I'd probably make a snap judgement about what a whiny little bitch I am. Although I'd like to think I'd delve a little deeper before snapping off a comment.

So for reasons that I am unaware of, comments are pretty thin on the ground.  Granted, every so often I've defended myself swiftly and harshly so those people have probably never ventured back; and if they have, they sure as Hell weren't going to open their mouths.  But hey, until you walk a mile in my shoes, it's oh so easy to see the world in a different way; and that is everyone, including the Squeeze.  Until I said "imagine how you would feel if Saturday morning, I woke up to a a tirade of delusion and demands from some guy; and then actually went about doing as I was told!"  It did give him pause and he state that he probably wouldn't like that.

The blog I did tonight did garner a comment with an excellent suggestion - segregate those Harridan gems such as "YOU R A F*CKING ARSEHOLE" (sorry, I had to tone that down a tad) and "u will have him ly on yr couch for a fortnite from 28th I won't be here..." - great, thanks for the notice you stupid cow.  I mean we actually have jobs and work for a living.  What that means in the real world is that we have to apply for holidays and have them approved - and bosses, ignorant fools that they are, get narky if they only get 3 seconds notice!

This isn't even thinking of the fact that if we haven't moved, then that two weeks won't be happening here.  And without notice, finding a spot to go camping is proving difficult.  I guess he could always go with the "sure thing, I'll have him at your place.  He can stay home and lie on the sofa while I go to work and I won't have to worry about the mess - because it's already a hovel!"

Anonymous gave me an excellent suggestion - keep the texts but put them some place else.  So from here on, I'll put Harridan rants up on the Classic Harridan Communiqué page - what a fantastic idea!

Blogging no longer means typing...

Well - I just have to come out and admit it...  This bitch has ruined my blog.  Her text messages are so beyond the pale; so in you face "raving nutcase, I'm a freaking loony" that mere words just pale into insignificance.

I no longer have to think... or type.  Why would I?  How can you compete with these gems..?

This is today's rant...

And the orders just keep on coming....

What’s happening...?
Well I’m just going to go out on a limb and hazard a guess as to what's not happening.  Peace!  Again!

Yep...  It's okay to pitch an external drive at his head - but no walking to extra shops!  And hop to it... NOW!!!!!!  Hey... moron; work it out.  If he loses his job due to jumping to your commands while at work, guess who isn't getting maintenance..?

I guess there is no power in the redback haven..?  Or neither of them can turn on a computer to add one line to a CV that we created for him...  I mean seriously; has this bitch got a bone in her leg..?        AND HOP TO IT SLAVE!      NOW!!!!

And then, classic Harridan guilt...  Ummm actually we’ve taken him every weekend, written and printed the CV, encouraged him, applied online.  Out of curiosity, just what the hell have you done?

How do we stop this person?  I mean seriously...  Short of blocking her from his phone or whacking her with a shovel - how do you stop someone with this level of madness...?

Sybil...

Okay, I’ll freely admit it; I have no freaking idea how many personalities live inside the head of the Harridan.  Her text message tirades are a fragment of how it must feel to be inside her head – and it’s an ugly, lonely, place; a seesaw of rage, anger and martyrdom.

Every so often, the blinkers fall off and she gives a glimmer of insight into the real person that exists within.  I’ve always felt that her martyrdom was not born out of love for Kid 1, 2 or 3.  Instead, she is something of a narcissistic paradox.  Her suffering is not for the children; instead, it is so that she can tell the world – “Look at me… Look how I suffer…  See how I suffer for my children…”

And her madness is becoming worse with the passing of time.  Perhaps this is due to the fact that mostly, when I don’t think of her and the anchor she is to our lives – we are happy.  Happiness is not something she can conceive of.  That the Squeeze escaped her tyranny jealously seethes within.  Not because she loved him; but because he dared to leave her.  I’ve seen her text rants at him about how he left; which I’ve always found weird – given the fact that we have been friends for many years and I saw how many times she kicked him out, only to drag him back if she thought he may actually meet someone.

Yesterday, amongst her cruelness directed at the Squeeze and in fact, even her own kid; there were the odd tiny jewels of humour that I clung to.  She had called the Squeeze as he drove home, screamed abuse at him and told him she had abused the kid and thrown things at him when he got home – and it was of course, the Squeeze’s fault – because there was no “4 day” weekends worked out.  He had already told her he would arrange things with the kid and had explained to the Kid that while we live in this house, staying overnight was out on work days.  Hell, no way am I facing Mr Burns nudity in the morning again.  In fact the kid was fine with the “just not cutting it” do stuff and drop at home…  

So in utter fury at losing control of the situation, she screamed abuse and hung up on the Squeeze.  She called back multiple times and he didn’t answer – neither should he since he was in my car and the last thing I need is for him to zoom my new Mazda around a tree while arguing with the Harridan! 

Then came the diamond…. “Ring back or I’m ringing Brunhilde!”  -  And there it was.  Please God!  Why didn’t that bitch call; because unlike the Moodle, I’d have in no uncertain terms, let her know that “divorce means you stop ordering around!”  Tirade…?  She doesn’t know the meaning of the word!

Now that the thought of calling me has slithered in to her insane brain, I cling to the hope of it happening!

I’ve attached another snap shot of the text diatribe from yesterday (she is yellow, he blue) - love the bit where I am supposed to be office  works - printing CV's  And the repeated "GET HIM A JOB!" - ummm how..?  How can we do that..?

So she oscillates from morose uncooperativeness into blind fury and insults directed at the Squeeze and anyone else she can think of – even telling the Squeeze he is just like his own father which is a callous blow.  His father wasn’t much in the father department.  He was fond of breeding, obviously, but not fond of rearing.  And he loved to marry.  Marry a lot.  He just forgot to divorce in between  J

My favourite line in the whole thing is "u should ring kid and chat to him. he realy sad".
Ummm no kidding!!!!  You abused him, threw stuff at him!  You make everyone's life a living hell!

I wonder why he is really sad!!!!

Dredilocks and the fearful Moodle...

The idiot that I live with doesn't get what I mean when I tell him it’s time to ‘man up’; ‘nut up’; shut her down already.  She’s horrible!   And attempting to explain it to him is a thankless expedition into the mind of a simpleton.  He can’t understand what I mean when I say “Jesus!  Would you stop Moodling around and tell her to get stuffed like 99% of the rest of humanity would in your position! 

Non-stop orders!  Abuse!  Demands!”

Last night, while attempting to give him the ‘shut her down or I will’ discussion, I explained it in as simple terms as possible.

Hell, if I’d have had to dumb it down anymore, it would have started with “Once upon a time, there was a tiny, scared little bear named “the Moodle”.   He lived in fear of the hideous, evil velvet wearer named Dredilocks – with her red-back infested hair…”  I’m sure you get my drift.

Instead, I merely said “just say Saturday morning rolls around and I get a string of text message demands from some guy – and I’m actually stupid enough to jump to those orders – how would you feel..?”  I think he got my drift, but probably not enough to nut up.

Below, is Saturday mornings treat – before he went to cricket and copped the live version…

Yes.  This is an actual snap shot.

All bets are off…

On Sunday, November 4, the Squeeze uttered the words that made my heart sink all the way down to my Greek slippers.  I’m sure I actually saw the pom pom’s wilt.  “Sit down, we need to talk…” – which accompanied him pulling out a chair.

That was 34 days ago; or approximately 5 weeks.

Since that time, I’ve lived on a roller coaster of not knowing from one minute to the next, what the Hell was going on or where my life was going.  I’ve had stress and angst to the point of heart palpitations.  I have lived on the edge of his irritation; directed at me because I don’t want his 15 year old to move into my 2 BR apartment.  Obviously he and the Harridan have absolutely no care at all about my children or my parents or my siblings having nowhere to stay if they come to visit.  Why would they get any consideration..?

Just as they sit for the tick box discussion, where 5 of those 6 tick boxes contains my name, yet I’m not entitled to be at the table discussion on my life or my home.

Me and mine do not exist on the totem pole.  I never will.

It is about my lack of compromise – except I already compromise every single second weekend of my life and have done so now for 3+ years.  I sacrifice my sanity to this utter Harridan who is unbalanced, intruding into our lives – continuously.   In an attempt to compromise prior to this being raised, I had suggested he take one or two nights a week to go bond with the kid – in a way that didn’t impact me.  But according to the Harridan, dinner and an activity doesn’t count.

She says it doesn’t count so of course, the puppet that I live with, mimics her words at me – even though he had agreed to the idea as a workable compromise just weeks ago and was in fact, already going off to movie nights etc.

Hell, I didn’t even see her stick her hand up his arse to move his lips with the “that just doesn’t cut it…” – how good a ventriloquist is this woman?

Then I get the guilt card…  If he moves out it is because of me – because I didn’t just accept another person to be in my life - full time.   Double the laziness, washing, ironing, cleaning…  And we both know it isn’t just the kid; the escalation of the Harridan’s shotgun blasts of attack would be unbearable.

So I hunkered down; stuck to my guns.  Cajole all you want; it ain’t working!  I’m not living with a kid where I have no say or power.  I’m not having a kid live in my house 24/7 where all “decisions” will be round table affairs that I’m not allowed to attend.  That is the reality of it and all the promises in the world won’t alter it – because I know who and what these people are…  It’s that simple.

I’m the box standing off to the side while all these round pegs are sitting in their neat little holes of delusion.

Next option was that we move to a bigger house.  Sure, but then I have the same issue where my life is dictated to by a nut job…   The relationship would end and suddenly, I would have no home.  Here I am safe.  Here it is mine and if the relationship doesn’t work, he moves out the door.

Yesterday, he went off to meet the Harridan to get the “definitive answer”.  Because I’ve had it; he is moving out and getting a place with the kid; then she isn’t moving.  Then she is.  Not.  Is.  Not.  Is.  No….  If you are getting dizzy with that picture, imagine living in my head this last five weeks.

I mean enough is enough already.  Make a decision; and as he leaves the house I text “don’t come home without an absolute “in stone” decision”.

And when he comes home, we are where we were five weeks ago.  We are all going to have to sit and wait to see what the Harridan will do.  Move out.  Not.  Move out.  Not.  More arguments about why I have to suck up more time with the kid, just because she doesn’t accept the idea that dinner and a movie isn’t “kid time”.

And I can feel my emotions and feelings shrivel, because this selfish fool is hanging me out to dry.  I’ve seen it coming.  I’m prepared.  I know he is weak, but I’ve had one tiny glimmer of hope that he loves me enough to develop a spine and tell the Harridan: “This is how it is…  You have no say or opinion in our lives.  I have no care about yours or your finances or what you want.  Demand all you like but it means nothing.”

I can be downright obstinate when I feel as though I’m being pushed into a corner; and I have now reached the mulish position of “I’ve done enough damned compromising and I’m not doing any more” line in the sand.

Not doing any more and not waiting any longer for these morons to make decisions.  So I turn and say “okay, times up.  I don’t care what she is doing this week or next…   Make a decision and make it now.”  Hell, five weeks is enough time to treat someone you are supposed to love, as something worthless to you.

So I get some sighing, followed by the head back to glare at the heavens probably internally shouting at the Gods about the injustice of it all….  Then a return of RES (rat eye syndrome – where he would rather look at anything, except into my eyes) before he gets that final thrust of blame in.

“Given that he can’t live here, you leave me with no choice…”

Yes.  It is my fault; me who changed the rules of engagement.

And that was when I emotionally withdrew from this relationship.  That was the moment that all bets were off and the world changed.  Because from here on in, this is my world and I am the only one in it.  I don’t have to compromise my world at all anymore, and nor will I.   At all.

He better move quickly is all I can say, because this just became a kid free zone and I couldn’t care less what the Harridan says or does.

Groundhog’s Day

Once again, life stops while we await the Harridan.  Who knows where the gun will point in this round of Russian Roulette; hopefully we will get some answers and I'll be able to work out what the next chapter in my life will hold…

I’ve had quite a bit of discussion with the Squeeze over the last few days.  No mean feat I have to say; he tries to squeeze lengthy Harridan conversations into a couple of words. This is his way of attempting to ignore the drama but from my perspective, it is like pulling teeth.  I've also done quite a bit of rubiks cubing too I must say; thinking of the options… twisting and turning my brain until it clicks.

I’m not unsympathetic to his pain and position.  I know that if I said “sure, let’s all live together like one happy family…” this kid would be far better off.  He’d be going to school with clean hair… his uniform clean and pressed; shoes polished.  Home-made lamingtons in his lunch box!  No kooky, velvet wearing hippy weirdo poultices or whacks to the head with dead fish – he would see a real doctor and take the prescribed medication.  And just for once, get through a winter without having to drown in his own mucus!

But then my life would no longer be mine…  There would be more work for me; more expense for me; more emotional crap to deal with.

I have had children since I was twenty-one years old.  This is ‘my time’; or is supposed to be.  Even if all the planets were aligned, I don’t want to go back to raising a teenager.  That isn’t even taking into consideration that this poisonous witch would then be firmly entrenched in my life. 

Every… single.. day. 

She would never relinquish control and just let us live in peace.   She is incapable of even a modicum of objectivity.  There is no us.  There is only her.  And then a poor second… The kid - all masked within her cloak of martyrdom.  She would be relentless.  The terminator, chasing down the car and hooking her greedy claws into the boot as we raced away.  There would be no stopping her.  She absolutely would not stop...

So if in a moment of weakness I feel like saying “oh Hell, let’s give it a shot then…”  I don’t.  I can’t.  Because I know that this would be Hell for me and this would end us.

And in amongst it all is the anger.

He is angry at me because he feels that I am putting him in the position to leave… Forcing his hand; changing our relationship.  He is no Mr. Romance, but beneath his moodleness and his inability to do a reasonable facsimile of Clarke Gable ready to sweep me off my feet, he is real. 

He loves me.  I am his best friend.

As for me; I am angry at him.  Because he is changing the terms of our relationship, forcing me to walk away from the person I love… My best friend. 

And in my head, it feels as though he is eliminating any chance we have of buying a house; risking the destruction of our relationship – and all so that his kid can go to a public school with a reasonable music program…

I hope it is worth it.

But wait; there is more....

The Harridan called tonight while we were at boxing.  In fact judging by the list of missed calls I saw for a brief flicker when he tossed the phone on the table as we got in the door, I assume she called multiple times.

His first mistake was to return the call (or answer another call, I'm not sure which)...  But that is the point that begins her ranting and raving about the fact that if she breaks the lease on the Blackburn house, she'll have to pay $500.  Frankly, I think this is rather generous.  Of course history would show that she has probably only got half the story and the $500 is the breaking lease/advertising charge.  She hasn't yet worked out that she has to continue to pay rent while the agent finds another sucker to pay through the nose for a dark, ugly, box of a house.

But the general gist of her conversation is "what are you going to do about it!!!??"

Of course I'm only hearing one side of the conversation, but to hear that damned Moodle say "I don't have to worry about that yet" nearly made me bust my spleen.

Why does he ever have to worry about it?  Why does he not say what 99% of the sane population would say???  Ie:  "your problem you dumb cow!  You signed a lease.  Nothing to do with us!  You work it out!  I don't want to hear about it!"

But no.  It was "I don't have to worry about it yet..." and then my stress levels shoot through the roof again as the realisation kicks in...  Now that a week has spun by and she has changed her mind again, that will mean that the whole "if she moves, I'm getting a place with the kid" rears its ugly head again; is hanging over my head again - and once again, I'm left wondering what the hell is happening.

And suddenly I realise that this whole damned one sided life is getting less attractive by the moment.

In short; move out moron.  I no longer care.

My life in tick boxes…

I didn’t get much feedback after the meeting the Squeeze, Harridan and Kid had the other weekend to decide the fate of my life.   We had a house full of people at the time so I only received the briefest of updates.  Basically, things weren’t going to change, other than the fact that the kid wanted to spend more time with the Squeeze.

For some reason, in the world according to the Harridan, Squeeze and Kid, spending more time is an extremely precise activity without room for negation or variation.   For example, dinner and a movie do not meet the ‘spending more time’ criteria.   It is only ‘spending more time’ if he is in our home, ‘hanging’ – for the whole night.   This means 24/7 television.  Given that it is now summer I can only assume that would entail a cricket argument re the television - every single day. 

Frankly, this is my idea of Hell.

Personally, my thoughts are that the mid-week dinner followed by an activity is far better as bonding time.  There is nil bonding in our house.  The only conversation that occurs at home is the Squeeze’s repeated requests that are subsequently ignored.  Ie:  “go have a shower and get ready, we are leaving”.   I heard that same statement ten times yesterday morning.  At one point when the kid slunk into the dining room and started to unwrap the newspaper, I said “you start reading that newspaper and I’ll give you the wooden spoon!” It may have been an idle threat, but he got the picture and mooched off to the bathroom.

But then I entered the land of bliss.  Finally, I had the house to myself for the afternoon so I proceeded to do a bit of a tidy.

The day before I had run the vacuum cleaner over the house and in a pique, grabbed the armful of clothes haphazardly strewn about the floor on the Squeeze’s size of the bed and tossed them behind the door so I could vacuum.  If you are wondering why I didn’t open the wardrobe on his side and just throw them in there, that would be because there was no way I could fling them in there without them tumbling out to hit me in the face.  His wardrobe is clean freak hell and I try not to look inside when I open it.

However, now in tidy mode and feeling a tad guilty, I grabbed the mound of clothes and began sorting in to washing/folding piles.  Emptying pockets found all manner of crap that would otherwise dot clothes throughout the wash but the find of the day was a folded piece of paper where the Harridan had drawn a bunch of tick boxes with the options for the future.

Out of the 6 options the Harridan had noted in boxes, 5 of them had my name in it.  How the hell do these fools think that they can sit and draw boxes and design my life without me being part of that discussion?  Here they are, playing Russian roulette with MY LIFE!  

Sorry about the difficult to read names; I de identified!