Not my department.........

Jeff, while getting ready for bed, questioned me as to why random batteries keep showing up on his bathroom counter. I explained that batteries, being generally a man thing, are his "department" and that he needed to see if they were still good. I find these batteries in random places, because the kids, not being good stewards of MY money, enjoy running the batteries out on their various electronic gadgets (mostly be leaving them ON) and then switch them out with fresh, new (expensive) batteries and leave the lifeless ones lying about. How am I to know which ones are good and which ones are bad? That is my man's job.

He, in turn, obviously considers many things MY department. For instance, the other day I cleaned out my car. I found such things as three hair bands, a stick of gum, someone's glasses (not in my family) and a Cold Stone gift card. I set them aside to redistribute to their rightful owners, placing them on a desk in the garage, and Jeff immediately felt the need to relocate them, because that was "crossing the 38th parallel" as he likes to say, which means I have placed foreign objects in his territory. His solution? To dump them all in my stair drawer. (Explanation - we have a small chest of drawers located near the stairs in which to dump random things that have been left carelessly lying about the house. The idea is that each person would empty this drawer and put things back in their spots. But, haha, that never happens! Still, it's a handy place to stash junk). Anyway, Jeff just dumped this stuff in my drawer and I went nuts. "Stop it!" "What are you doing?" "Why do you just assume that's my stuff?"

But that's just the thing. Certain stuff is just assumed to be my department or his department. My department -  anything Jeff doesn't want, understand, or care about. His department - anything gross, mechanical, or requiring lots of physical labor. Laundry, for example, is my department. As in, if I have dumped a load of towels on the bed to fold and then, oh, I don't know, gotten distracted by the 435,000 other things I had to do, and I finally head to my room to drop into bed, I find Jeff sleeping soundly on HIS side, and the pile of towels on MY side. See? My department.

Sometimes, the departments cross. Never a good thing. For example, making school lunches. Jeff assumes it's  MY department, but I say if I'm out at night late and get home at 10 p.m. and no lunches are made, I'm gonna go all bitch on someone (Jeff). So, after having a "discussion" about it, we decided that making lunches was both of our "departments". And we really hate it. How we both wish we could pass that department off on someone else.......

So, here's a fun little quiz for you. Guess who's department the following items belong in? Camera, video camera, bread machine, cupcake tins, Fred Meyer receipt, fishing catch record, filthy lunch box, clean lunch box, Christmas light bulb, plug in air freshener, can of sardines, box of swiss cake rolls, scrapbooking supplies, soap making equipment. Ok, here are your answers: Me, Jeff, Jeff, me, me, Jeff, Jeff, me, Jeff, me, Jeff, me, me, and, surprisingly, Jeff!

What's in YOUR department?