Remember who's In Charge

Nearly 4 hours mooching around Valletta alleyways, churches, galleries and antique shops in drizzly but warm rain at 19C, then a spectacular thunderstorm with lightning show enjoyed from a hotel bar overlooking the harbour. That was Saturday, unfortunately it wasn't me. It was a whatsapp message from our son and partner who are in Malta for a few days with friends. I replied that it sounded great, well the thunderstorm overlooking the harbour did, and was going to tell him it was 4C in the UK and the wallpaper wasn't coming off the walls as easy as it should have done and the plaster underneath was dodgy in parts so P was going to patch it, oh and the plug sockets circuit had blown and wouldn't re-set because P had applied water to the walls extravagantly and soaked the electrics.....but I didn't. Instead I said the decorating was going great, yeah, no problem, have a great time send us some pictures, love Mom.

You see we'd promised to do a few jobs for them while they were away, they need it, they both work long hours and their new house is proving more of a challenge than they, and we, thought. They even thought about cancelling their mini break last minute because they've got so much on but P said no don't do that, recharge your batteries and we'll do a bit on the house while you're away. Good intentions, I can't fault my husband on his heart being in the right place but he does dive into things sometimes.

We'd had a few words after the sockets blew because I couldn't boil a kettle to make a cup of tea. He said just put a saucepan on the stove, which was gas, but then it occurred to me I couldn't hear the fridge running so that was off too, we couldn't just leave it for days for the electrics to dry out. So P huffed a bit then took the sockets off the walls in the dining room, where he'd been water splashing, and taped the wires up and said that would neutralise them and stop them tripping the rest of the circuit. He was right, it worked, he reset the circuit and fridge whirred into life and the kettle boiled and we got our cups of tea. But what a fuss all because he knew best and got stuck in without thinking. There were other little mishaps, I won't go into them but suffice it to say they were caused by P (and corrected by him too, I have to admit) and I criticised his working methods several times. He got annoyed with me and told me he would spank me if I didn't get on with my jobs and leave him to do his. Looking around me I thought not much chance of spanking me here but I toned down anyway and we had a productive day.

We drove home about 7pm, it's less than thirty minutes, P said he'd get a couple of steaks out if that was OK with me. It was, I didn't fancy going out and Saturday night is difficult last minute anyway. P went straight to the kitchen to put some potatoes in the oven and I went upstairs to clean up. Within minutes I heard his footsteps on the stairs and then he was in the bathroom  where I was pulling bits of wallpaper from my hair. He marched me into the bedroom, I objected that I wasn't finished, he said it didn't matter I could come back in five minutes and finish off preening...if I could stand still in front of the mirror.

I said, "You can't spank me we're home now, the day's over, I haven't done anything." Well I hadn't really.

"I know the day's over but all the fuss you were making earlier about a few little setbacks and telling me how I should and shouldn't be doing things and how I should have listened to you etc etc, but if I'd listened to you we wouldn't have got through half as much as we have. And furthermore, in fact most annoying, is the way you went on at me instead of just giving me chance to fix the little things that went wrong."

I thought about that as he was undoing my jeans, it was true. I apologised and said I was wrong and I wouldn't do the same tomorrow.

"I know you won't," he said, "because you're going to get your backside spanked and you won't like it and it'll remind you to think before you criticise my practical skills."

And I was over his lap with my jeans down to my knees and my knickers at my thighs in no time and his rough hands, still dry from plaster and filler, spanking my bottom good and hard. I kept saying sorry, which I really did mean, I didn't squeal too much even though it hurt because that sometimes excites him to do it harder, in fact it excites me too but I was hungry and achey from a long day and I wanted it to be as short as possible. It ended with me promising I'd be supportive and positive the next day and follow his lead in everything we did and please let me off, I'd learned my lesson. He stopped and told me to get up and said "Well just remember, we're a team we work together and solve problems as we go along."

And then as he went out the door, "Just remember who's in charge."  

I'm sure he would have had a smile on his face as he said that although I didn't see it as I was pulling my knickers and jeans up and looking the other way. We had a very nice simple meal and bottle of wine about an hour later and watched a  couple of episodes of The Crown before going to bed.

Have a funn weekend.

Ronnie

xx