by April Wolfe
Photo: © Depositphotos.com/piotr_marcinski
We know you’ve all been there. You and your husband are in the kitchen grooving to The Big Chill soundtrack, mixing up big heaping bowls of salad, when your husband’s phone rings, and he has the gall to interrupt this emblematic moment of how much better your relationship is than your friend Tracy’s by actually answering the phone! When his back is turned, you pick up that Ginsu and just pretend to let him have it, right in the skull! Only, you forget your husband has mild fibromuscular dysplasia that makes him dizzy when he moves too fast, and to your absolute horror…he impales himself right on your favorite tomato knife!
It happens more often than not, folks. So to protect yourself from accidentally killing your spouse while only pretending to kill your spouse, we’ve collected the top 5 ways you could accidentally kill your spouse while only pretending to kill your spouse.
1. The Ol’ Gypsy Curse
Ugh, this one is so classic it has us banging our heads against the wall. We really should have figured this out by now! Unfortunately, everyone and his brother thinks it’s a funny idea to seek out an old gypsy in the woods and merely pretend to place a slow-death-by-shedding-skin curse on their husbands, just to teach them a little lesson about respect, and calling if you know you’re going to be late.
Sadly, gypsy curses are nothing to laugh at. Sure, gypsies, with their dirty faces and their centuries-long diaspora and general fear of genocidal political policies, they are a hoot. (If you know one, invite them to your next going-away party.) But gypsy curses are a different matter. And the last thing you want to do is come home to a man with curdling skin in your bed. Next time: Ixnay on the Gypsay. That’s what we always say.
2. Dental Instruments Up the Nose
I don’t know how much time you spend with dental-related content farms, but there are A LOT of folks out there who bring more than their laughing gas home with them. While there are many ways dentists can accidentally kill their spouses while only pretending to kill their spouses, the most prevalent one we’ve found is the ouch-inducing tartar scraper up their snot snooter.
Sure, it’s tempting to just dismantle your partner’s frontal lobe via entry of the nasal cavity when they’re snoring like a banshee. But while they sure do look funny with that shit just sticking out of their nose like that, it’s also likely they may want to sneeze or claw at their face in horror, thereby actually dismantling their own brain when you only meant to pretend to do it. But guess who would have egg—and brain matter—on his face? That’s right. You.
3. Arsenic-Powdered Donut
I know what you’re thinking. If they didn’t want you to scare a little respect into your S.O., why would they ever make a powdered arsenic that looks appetizing on cake donuts? It really seems like they were asking for it, doesn’t it? Still, it’s helpful to remember that even if you put a little toothpick flag marked “POISON” on the tray of arsenic-powdered donuts to tell them apart from the tray of non-arsenic-powdered donuts, some people just don’t read or follow directions. Especially your idiot sonofabitch husband.
We can’t really blame you for his mistakes, but it’s still your responsibility to encourage your spouse to stay on a healthy, well-balanced diet. You know how the saying goes with arsenic-powdered donuts: A moment on the lips, a lifetime.
4. Straight-Up Dog Attack
God, sometimes it’s hard to deny that marital rage. It’s just seething there on the surface, especially after you’ve spent a long afternoon at the butcher shop with your baby and can’t seem to connect on an intellectual level like you used to. It’s tempting to want to snap them out of this funk with a fake dog attack, but be careful.
Dogs are animals. They pee outside! There’s no telling how they might act, even if you both agreed to stick to the original plan. So planting a salami in your lover’s back pocket and coaxing the canines from your neighbor’s trailer is never a failsafe plan. Never. Believe us, you won’t quickly forget the sad look in that dog’s eyes when you put it down for fatally attacking your sweetheart. And that’s something we don’t want to chew on.
5. Faux Dr. Deathing Him
When your bae’s been in their wheelchair for a minute, paralyzed from the neck down and begging for sweet release, we admit, it’s enough to want to take off that wheel break and let ‘em ride right off a cliff. (You probably shouldn’t do that, either.) But the absolute most fatal thing you could do to pretend to kill your spouse is to give him a ride in a Dr. Death van, hoping it’ll beat a new lease on life into him.
This one seems pretty obvious, but we’d be remiss if we didn’t remind you that your Death Wish Dashing Dan may actually plan on following through with a gentle and ethical assisted suicide. Many a bride have left their spouses in the hands of renegade medical professionals with a little wink and smile, only to return from the fro-yo shop to find the father of their children dancing with the devil in hell. (Suicide is a SIN, guys!) So to be extra safe, try feeding some of that gorgeous fro-yo to your honey to lift up his spirits, instead of sending his spirit to eternal damnation.
In conclusion, we know it’s fun to pretend to kill your spouse. We’d do it everyday if we could. But the fact of the matter is that pretending is murder. We hope you folks will try to find safer ways to terrify some goddamned respect into our life partners. We know we will!
April Wolfe writes and performs and makes films and plays in Los Angeles. She’s the founder of One Axe Plays and publishes essays and reported features in Marie Claire, Vice, CityLab, TakePart, ATTN, Good, and other magazines. www.awolfeswolfworld.com