I'm Predicting It Now

I remember making a list of the top ten things that make my heart drop. And number one on that list (posted on this very blog on August 6th, 2009) was getting a phone call from my wife that starts with, "Okay, don't be mad…." And as it turns out, my heart can drop just as much when I read those same words in a text message. This message said, "Okay, don't be mad. But I dropped my iPhone and broke the screen."

And I had a different reaction than you might think. I wasn't angry or disappointed. My very first reaction was a tiny bit of excitement. It was closely followed by disappointment, but for one fleeting instant, I got excited because I knew what was going to happen in the near future.

I'm not one to hold a grudge, and I would never actually be mad at my wife for accidentally breaking something. So I'm not counting on some kind of cruel vindication or argument ammunition. But I'll earn some husband points without even trying.

See, what will happen is that my wife will apologize profusely for the next few days. And I will continuously wave it off because I'm honestly not concerned about it. The phone is functional; it's just not pretty anymore. And it's also not my phone. So nothing about that situation bothers me. But in my wife's eyes, I'll be a patient man who has graciously accepted her apology for the travesty of destroying an Apple product. And she'll love me for it.

Let me stress here that I won't be taking advantage of her misguided sense of appreciation. I'm not gonna milk it or make her feel bad. But I will be using it for a very specific purpose. At some point in the next two weeks, she'll mention the phone and how upset she is that she did it. And my response will be to ignore her repeated apologies and immediately say, "Hey, we should rent a movie tonight." And because her mind is still on the phone and how she's apparently let me down, she'll let me pick the movie! So I'll pick Robin Hood or X-Men Origins: Wolverine. And for once, I won't have to fight for it.

I'm sure someone reading this thinks I'm joking. But I'm totally not. That is a huge win for me. I can't wait to see Russell Crowe hit someone with a flaming arrow or Hugh Jackman extend his computer-generated claws from his knuckles. And frankly, I don't know how I've gone this long without seeing the Wolverine movie.