Today, I messed up by not being able to explain to my wife the existence of a dress that

wasn't hers in the wash.

Friends, my marriage was on the edge of a knife just now.

Storytime.

My wife, a 40-year-old woman, came into the bedroom with an unknown dress that she found

in the dryer.

She asked, where did this dress come from?

Mistified, I said, it's not yours? I know my own dresses. At this point, she's making light,

but there is smoldering anger behind those brown eyes, and I knew I was legitimately in danger.

Um, I have no idea.

At this point, I'm scrambling to come up with anything that doesn't look like I'm cheating.

Because even I realized that despite being innocent, this doesn't look good, and I'm in trouble.

I have no idea where the dress is from.

Stalling for time, I ask what size it is. A dumb, fricking question.

Not her size. Frickety frick. Alas, it was way too small for me while being too large for her.

More scrambling, and I say, maybe it was from daycare and got sent back with my kid, a three-year-old boy's,

dirty clothes. A long stretch, but I'm painfully aware that the longer this mystery goes on,

the more screwed I am. No one has stayed at our house in the last two years. The whole time I'm

thinking, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, I suggest maybe someone

is sabotaging me. It sounded stupid the moment I said it, but I mean, what the frick is happening? I then say,

it's kind of nice, maybe you should try it on. Please, nobody ever take advice from me ever.

Her eyes are beginning to promise my horrible death, despite still seeming amused.

...