Testosterone Poisoning

On my way out to do some errands yesterday, I encountered two of the finest neighbors I’ve ever been privileged to know chatting in the street. Not at all uncommon here on Divorce Court, the cul-de-sac of the second chance.

Lady J from next door and Lady H from across the street were having a confab on the concrete. Since for once I wasn’t running late for some time-specific appointment, which causes me to wave and drive on, I got a chance to stop and join them.

Lady J was quick to let me know that they were grousing about their male partners. “You won’t believe this,” she shared. Her husband, Sir K, had been on his wet roof the day before, blowing leaves off, when he slipped and fell off the house, spraining his ankle.

“OMG—he’s lucky he didn’t do much more damage,” I said, incredulous. (Bear in mind that Sir K is, shall we say, of a certain age, RETIRED, after all, and has no more business getting up on a slippery, wet roof than I do flying a 747.) I recounted the story of a friend of ours who fell from his roof about five years ago and broke multiple bones. Lady H chimed in, telling us of a neighbor a few streets over who fell off his roof, broke his neck and died on the spot! (Game, set, match.) Can’t top that!

Meanwhile, Lady H is furious with her significant other, Sir J, because he had arthroscopic knee surgery and won’t follow doctor’s orders to stay off it. “He’s gone to the bank, he’s up and around as if it never happened!” Having had the same surgery a few years back, she knows whereof she speaks. “We’ve had it with both of them! They’re crazy—are you ready to leave CoTU (you remember my hub, the Center of the Universe) too?”

“Come to think of it, he definitely belongs in the same club. He won’t get up on the roof, but he did take the leaf blower out on the deck the other day to get rid of the leaves. It started raining while he was out there, but he persevered and finished the job. When I came home he told me he thought he might be the first Electrical Engineering graduate of the University of Missouri at Rolla to have his degree revoked posthumously!”

Yeah, have we heard somewhere that electricity and water don’t mix? Shocking, I’d say!

Notice that didn’t stop him from doing it.

We all kind of spontaneously rolled our eyes, shook our heads and threw our hands up in the air. We don’t understand why we can’t reason with them. Or maybe we do… It’s a guy thing. It’s the Y chromosome. You just can’t fight testosterone poisoning.