The One With All The Gas

*Author's note:  I apologize in advance for this blog posting.

My husband Dan and I had this conversation yesterday while driving together to an appointment:


Me:  *suddenly and inexplicably being over-taken by the most heinous cloud of stink ever to encounter the human nostril*

Me:  *gasping for air and clawing frantically at the button to roll down the window*

Me:  *hanging my head out the window like a demented Shi-Tzu and sucking in oxygen*

Dan:  "What?"

Me:  *finally able to speak*  "WHAT. THE HELL. DID YOU DO??!!"

Dan:  *looking perplexed*  "Why?  What's wrong?"

Me:  "SERIOUSLY??  DO YOU NOT SMELL THAT?"

Dan:  "Smell what?"

Me:  "ARE YOU KIDDING ME??  DID YOU FART??"

Dan:  *taking a moment to ponder this apparently difficult question*  "I don't know... I don't think so."

Me:  "YOU DON'T THINK SO?  THERE ARE TWO OF US IN THE CAR.  I KNOW FOR A FACT THAT I DID NOT FART.  THAT LEAVES YOU."

Dan:  "Huh.  Maybe I did.  I don't remember."

Me:  *gulping in air like a beached guppy*

Dan:  "Man, that stinks..."


This is where I went totally crazy and beat him to death with my purse.


Okay, not really.  But I did wax eloquent for the next 10-15-20 miles about how it is simply not possible to pass gas and not remember.


My soliloquy included such pearls of wisdom as "How does something come out of your ass and you not realize it??  I have never had anything come out of my ass without me being aware of it" and "Seriously?  Your ass is so independent of your brain that wind can shoot right out of it without your knowledge?  How is that even possible?"

His contributions to the conversation mostly consisted of the phrases "I don't know..." and "Could you drop it already?  It was a fart, okay?  It's not like I burned down an orphanage."

Me:  "You might as well have!" 


Because yeah, it was that bad.

Here's what I don't get:  How can a man who demands to know "what that smell is" every time he enters a room not smell a powerful stink bomb that has just emerged from the depths of his boiling and surging bowels?  Because that's what he does.  He will be idly sitting on the couch and suddenly will raise his head, look suspiciously around, and start sniffing the air like a blood hound on the scent.  "What's that smell?" he will demand, while the dogs and I sit quietly next to him and try not to look guilty.  Or smelly.

 

"I don't smell anything..." I will say, while the dogs nod their heads and hope it isn't them, because honestly?  I don't.  I smell nothing.

 

I surreptitiously sniff my arm pit when he isn't looking.  Nope, all good.

 

The dogs sniff their arm pits.  Also good.

 

He will continue to sniff and glare, occasionally wafting his hands to circulate the scent more efficiently.  "You don't smell that," he states.  Not a question... more of an accusation, like how is it even remotely possible that any normal human being can't smell whatever elusive aroma is tickling his nose hairs.

 

This can go on for hours.  If he can't ferret out the stink (which he usually can't... and I can't help because I cannot smell it) he will suddenly look at me and say, "Is it YOU?"

 

 Because apparently I'm known for my stench.  The fuck, I say!  He will lean over, sniff me, sigh, and say, "No... you're fine."

 

Well thank the Lord for small favors.  It's never me.  Yet he sniffs me suspiciously every. single. time.

 

Me:  *insulted*  "It is never me!  Stop smelling me!"

 

(Doesn't everyone have to order their spouse to stop sniffing them?  No?  Just me?)

 

He lets me know when the dogs smell, when the house has a strange odor, when dinner seems slightly off, when my shampoo isn't right, when I change my perfume, buy him the wrong scent of deodorant...

 

But he can't smell his own farts.  Or recognize what's going on when one escapes from his ass.

 

And therein lies the mystery.

 

Color me skeptical.

 

 

 Other conversations have gone something like this:


Dan:  *sniff sniff* 

Me:  "What?"

Dan:  *sniff sniff*  "Do you smell that?"

Me:  "Smell what?"

Dan:  "Did you fart?"

Me:  "No?  Why?  Oh my GOD!!!  WHAT IS THAT?"

Dan:  *light dawning on his face*  "Oh yeah... maybe that was me.  Sorry."

Years ago I had a Rottweiler named Coco.  She was the most amazing dog ever... fat, lazy, loving... and full of gas.  I have never before or since had a pet that farted as constantly or as noisily as Miss Coco-moco.  All day, every day, earth, air, wind and fire were shooting out of her hind quarters with alarming regularity. 

And yet...

And yet...

Every single time she farted, she would look startled, whip her head around, and bark at rear end.

Every. Time.

You'd think she would have eventually figured it out... like, "Oh yeah, that happened last time and it was just me again, farting..."  But she never did.  It was a huge surprise to her for the entire 10 years she spent on this earth. 

That's kind of how Dan is.  For 40 years he has been releasing noxious fumes from his rectum and he still doesn't get that the noise is coming from him.

This man has more gas that the Middle East and Texas combined.  Millions of years ago, dinosaurs curled up and died in his lower intestine and have been waiting ever since to emerge from his rectum in the form of methane gas.  Meanwhile, he firmly believes that if he holds in a fart, he will immediately explode and die.  Consequently, he has no compunction about farting anywhere and everywhere the need arises.  A typical trip to the store goes like this:


Me:  *casually standing in the aisle, perusing products and comparing prices* 

Dan:  *suddenly walking up behind me and shoving me down the aisle whispering "Go! Go! Go!" under his breath as we power walk through the store*

Me:  "What the..."  And then I notice the people walking down the aisle behind us, gagging and puking and clutching their throats.


I don't get it.  I really don't.  I would hold in a fart until my head blew off my shoulders before I would release it in a public forum.  But Dan?  Dan farts everywhere.  Work, home, church (if we went, that is), weddings, funerals, family gatherings... He does it so constantly and so naturally that he doesn't even know he's doing it.

 The 16 year old nephew, Dorkin, is starting to follow in Uncle Dan's footsteps.  (Hard not to when your role model has a never ending green cloud clinging to the seat of his pants, not unlike Pepe Le Pew.)  He is still at the age where every time he lets one go, he practically pees himself with delight.  The worse it smells, the funnier it is, apparently. 

But not to the King of Gas.


When Dorkin farts, Dan gets pissed.

"What the hell?" he will bark.  "What's wrong with you?  You just sit there and fart in front of your aunt?"

Me:  "YOU fart in front of his aunt."

Dan:  "I never farted in front of my aunts!"

Me:  "You fart in front of your parents, your brothers, their wives, their kids, my sister, her kids, their kids, my mother, your co-workers, your clients, your doctor, your friends, my friends, strangers in a grocery store, but not your aunts?"

Dan:  *long pause*  "That's right.  And don't you forget it."


An evening of togetherness usually ends with Dan loudly ripping ass then doing his Steve Urkel impression, "Did I do that?"  He will then laugh himself off the couch while I choke and die from the fumes.


That's love, baby.

 

Notes from the marriage bed...

*Author's note:  This isn't about sex, in case you were worried (or hopeful... whichever).  I'm pretty sure my children would prefer believing that they were each the product of a star in the east, three wisemen, a manger, and a virgin birth, so one thing I will never write about is my sex life (not that I have one... don't worry, boys, Mommy is as pure as the driven snow).  


*Sidebar:  When my son Shea was around 6, one of the gross, lice infested, neighborhood mutant germ children told him about sex and "where babies come from."  Shea came to me, sobbing, and demanded to know if that was the truth.  I admitted that yes, indeed, that IS how it happens.  He looked at me with betrayal on his precious little face and demanded, "You mean you and dad did that THREE TIMES?!"


Anyway.


Let me share with you a typical morning in my house:


The alarm goes off at 7:00 a.m.  Dan hammers the crap out of the snooze button, wedges his backside against me, sighs contentedly, and farts.


I hold my breath and lie very still, so as not to lift the covers so that none of the gasses can escape and assault my nose.


He farts again, rendering all my efforts moot.


I say, "Really, Dan?  REALLY?  You have to press your ass against me and fart?  REALLY?"


He pretends to be asleep.


I make a huge show out of flipping up the covers and stomping out of the bedroom, taking my freshly farted-on self into the kitchen to make coffee.


He lies there like a dead man, determined to keep up the charade of an innocent sleep-farter.  


Every.


Morning.


Farting is a huge bone of contention in my marriage.


I've tried to have an intelligent, adult discussion about this issue.


While I'm explaining that inhaling someone else's anal gasses is not my cup of tea, Dan snickers like an 8 year old and refuses to acknowledge that farting on your wife isn't the funniest damn thing a grown man can do. 


I get angry, he rolls his eyes and says things like, "What do you want me to do?  Hold it in?  Explode?"


I say yes.


He goes into detail about why  it isn't good or healthy for him to hold in his farts.  According to Dan, holding in a fart can kill you.


I tell him that so can farting on your wife.


He loudly insists that it isn't possible for him to hold in a fart.


I tell him he's full of shit.


He agrees with me and lets one rip.


He laughs.  I plot his demise.


And the battle wages on.

Farting is Dan's party trick.  As long as he has gas (which, frankly, he always does) he's ready for anything.  Want to embarrass the wife at Walmart?  Rip one in the aisle where she's shopping and hot foot it into the next aisle, leaving her encased in stink and looking guilty.  Laugh until tears pour down your face when she comes hauling ass around the corner with murder in her eye and tries to mow you down with the shopping cart.


Want to humiliate her for a hearty guffaw at the restaurant where you're having a romantic meal?  Let a silent-but-deadly one slip through your happy butt cheeks just as the waitress is bringing the appetizer and drink orders.  

Say, "DANI!" really loudly and look at her pointedly as the waitress smiles politely and tries to pretend she doesn't notice.


Act contrite when she refuses to speak to you for the rest of the evening and apologize when you get home, promising to never do such a heinous thing again.

She knows you're lying through your teeth because you ate too much, are tired of arguing, and just want to go to bed so you can fart some more.

Having game night with fam?  Partner up with the little woman during the card game and fart relentlessly and repeatedly, thus killing two birds with one stone:  

1.  Farting is hilarious so you get to be the life of the party (in your own mind) and crack yourself up for hours on end and

2.  Your parents are watching so there are witnesses, which  means she can't be the raving, screaming, bitch she really wants to be and she can't kill you.

Win, win.

And when she starts screeching like a harpy on the ride home, roll up all the windows, lock them, then fart again and laugh your ass off as she turns green and gags, because you really are a clueless bastard.  

Last night, as we were lying in bed, Dan kissed me lovingly goodnight (he's really very sweet, despite all the horrible things I say about him) and as he rolled over so I could spoon him (I'm chronically cold and I need to put my icy hands on his warm belly and my frigid feet on his normal, human temperature legs so I can fall asleep at night without contracting hypothermia) he let out a long, sonorous, multi-note blast from his rectal area.  For one brief moment, I could tell he was considering faking sleep (as if he could have fallen asleep as he was rolling over), but common sense got the better of him and he went with the the apology route, complete with an explanation:  "I didn't even know that was in there... it shocked me too..."

At that precise moment, Maisy, my pug, attacked his ass.

Oh yeah, baby.

Justice was served.

I'm pretty sure he was plotting his next fart the very moment this picture was taken.