The difference between men and women.

Oh, wait. As it turns out, one incident in my (ever more exciting life) does not translate to everyone else's experience. Go figure. But I was just trying to come up with a dramatic introduction. I think a more accurate title would be "The Difference Between Me Going out and That Lunkhead Going Out."

A's nights out are actually an extension of his day. He leaves at 8 in the morning, goes to his "job," heads directly to "tennis*" and arrives home between 10 and 11 pm. In case you haven't done the math, no worries, I have done it for you, many, many times. That's 15 hours. Sometimes, he comes home to slack off, change into his tennis clothes, get the children all fired up, spill food on the floor and leave a dirty cup on the counter help me with the children before he goes to tennis. I hate tennis. People ask if I play and, unable to answer, I just shudder.

When I go out, I leave after dinner, which I've made and, as often as not, cleaned up. If I don't stick around for dinner, I make sure to tell him what to feed the kids. Otherwise, he might forget. Or believe them when they say they're not hungry (Translation: I want to play outside and, once you get me in there, I know there's going to be a bath involved.) He lets them sleep in their dirty clothes. This practice is hardly verboten in our house, but I think it should be a special treat, reserved for weekends. No matter what I leave for dinner, he'll call me with a question.

"Does the rice go with the stir-fry or beside it?"

"Should I heat this or eat it cold?"

"Can you come home and spoon this into my mouth? Food scares me."

Some of my lady friends will remember fondly the evening about ten years ago, when A. called me while I was out to ask what he should do with the changing pad O. had peed on. When he couldn't reach me, he called one of my friends (Hi, Karin!) to ask her. For all I cared, he could have just thrown it in the trash. But I digress. What I really wanted to talk about was what he did Thursday night.

I hired our neighbor** to come over and entertain the children while I tidied the house. What a nice wife! The evening promised to be a difficult one for A, because I was meeting two friends at Garibaldi's around 6 pm - before dinner, homework, teeth brushing, wrestling match refereeing, forced room tidying and bedtime. To his credit, A is the man when it comes to putting SK to bed. I have washed my hands of the long and arduous process. In order to preserve the sanctity of the clean kitchen, I ordered a pizza from local favorite Dano's - spinach, pineapple and bacon, for the curious.

I know ordering a pizza with loud hungry children afoot can be a challenge and I still had the neighbor over to distract them while I performed the difficult task. Before I left, I shared the ETA of the pizza with Alex and made sure he had enough cash to pay. Away I went.

When I arrived, my two friends were already there. I cut to the chase and ordered a glass of wine. I started to relax. The time for the second glass of wine, the one that seals the deal, was approaching. Then the text messages started coming.

"Sorry to text in middle of lady dinner but where is pizza guy? I'll call. Did you Dano's?"

How thoughtful of him to make that call for me. And seven minutes later:

"Not yet and they are busy signal for 15 min."

Thanks for the update. Six minutes later:

"pizza just got here. enjoy crispy flounder."

Was this passive aggressive? I don't know. You be the judge. If it was, the folks from Dano's can take it up with my husband, because I think in a side by side taste test, their pizza is just as good as Garibaldi's Crispy Flounder. I didn't even order the crispy flounder. I had salmon and asparagus with a lemon beurre blanc and capers, an excellent choice. I enjoyed the leftover pizza for breakfast, equally excellent. Grazie e bravo, Dano's.

Now, you might be thinking I'm being a little hard on the guy. Really, he didn't hear me order the pizza and me thinking I ordered a pizza while not actually doing so isn't completely outside the realm of possibility. But get this. When I returned, there was a message on the machine.

"Hey, I'm calling from Dano's. Are y'all home? I knocked on the door and you didn't answer. I went around back and knocked on the door there and rang the bell. Trying to reach you. Give us a call."

For the record, these are the things my husband missed:

• A knock on the front door, probably followed by more knocking. I would venture to guess extreme knocking.
• A knock or ten on the back door. The bell, in fact, doesn't work, so I'll give him that one.
• Repeated phone calls.
• A blinking message light.
• A message from the pizza guy, pleading to be let in.

I know how the pizza guy felt, too. A. once locked me out "accidentally" and slept through my repeated attempts to entice him to let me into our house. I had to spend the night with a neighbor. That was not a pretty week. But I digress.

How could he miss all of the signs of impending pizza? It arrived right on schedule - Dano's is good that way. Maybe next time I'll hire the neighbor to come over and facilitate the pizza delivery. Or maybe I should handle the delivery myself. But then he'd call to find out if he should heat it...and for how long...

Namasté, y'all!

* Probably better described as "drinking Coors Light while wearing athletic clothes."

** Best Sitter Ever. She's increased the value of our house by at least $50,000. If you bring me a sandwich, a really good sandwich, I might even give you her number. Maybe.