Another typical home conversation.

(As UIM rises from the couch, he knocks a pillow off onto the floor.)
UIM: (singing) "F**k you, pillow; f**k yoooooou."
Frage: (from the bedroom) "What are you cursing now?"
UIM: "Everything.  I am launching imprecations at the totality of existence."
Frage: (tired) "Awesome."

Let's face it, folks, she's tired.

(UIM and Frage driving around, doing errands.)
(Frage is audibly irritated by a couple different pedestrians stepping thoughtlessly into the road in front of her.)
UIM : “You have to remember: These are simple people.”
(Frage chuckles.)
UIM: “The common clay of the new West.”
Frage: “What?”
UIM: “You know: morons.”
(Silence.)
UIM: “Look, I either answer that, or, ‘Mongo only pawn in game of life.’  Quotes from Blazing Saddles are all I’ve got right now.”
Frage: “Thank you so much.”
UIM: “I certainly don’t think I can respond with ‘I think he said the sheriff’s near’ relevantly.”

BOLO: A couple in their forties, being weird near the milk products...

(UIM and Frage are standing in the dairy aisle at Target.)
(Behind them, another customer is on the phone relating the various berry flavors of yogurt which are available.)
Frage: "Well, they don't have the brands I want."
UIM: "I just hope they have snozberry flavor."
Frage: (pats UIM on the shoulder) "Maybe someday they will have it for you."
(Frage leans in close.)
Frage: "Or maybe they'll have dingleberry flavor for you."
(Frage and UIM crack up laughing.)
UIM: "Ew.  Tastes like a Tea Party screed."
(Frage and UIM crack up laughing harder, gasping for air.)
UIM: " ' There's this weird couple, walks into various Targets, and stands around laughing in the dairy aisle.'  I don't want to be on a Target corporate Wanted poster."

Maybe we've got a motto there. Let's translate it into Latin and stick it under a shield.

UIM: "Well, I'm sorry I pushed the joke too far."
Frage: "No, you be you, honey."
UIM: "Awwww."
Frage: "And suffer the consequences."
UIM: "Grrrr."

Nothing you can do sometimes, because MFBC

(While in a cab on the way to work one morning, thanks to Metra trains running way behind, we discussed certain untrustworthy processes at my workplace.)
Frage: "I argued that, on the business end, but I'm sorry I couldn't stop the insanity."
UIM: "You couldn't have stopped the insanity, because no one is going to listen to the sane.  You could only have stopped it with worse insanity, because Motherf^{kers Be Crazy."
(Pause.)
UIM: " ' Hey, why do UIM and Frage have matching tattoos of MFBC on their clavicles?'  'Because Motherf^{kers Be Crazy.' "
Frage: "We might have to use it as the monogram on our wedding invitations."

We don't let him plan things. It's for everybody's safety.

(Frage comes through the living room as UIM watches music videos on demand.)
UIM: "Hey, sweetie, what do you think about this as your entrance music at the wedding?"
(UIM presses play, and Ludacris appears on tv.)
Ludacris: "My chick bad, my chick hood.  My chick do stuff your chick wish she could."
Frage: "I'd be worried and offended if I believed you were serious."

So much drama in Cook County.

We're getting ready for a car trip up to her dad's.  I'm coming back down to the city that evening to return the rental car.
Her: "So, what are your plans for the rest of the weekend?"
Me: "Oh, you know." (Pause.) "Rollin' down the street; smokin' indo; sippin' on gin and juice."
Her: "Make sure you take the cats with you.  April-kitty does love her gin and juice."

East Coast-West Coast strife

We're watching the music video for "Happy", by Pharrell Willliams.
Her: "Hey, it's MJ."
Me: "No, that's not Michael Jordan, that's Magic -" (pause) "oh."
Her: "Yeah, hello, Lakers' girl here."
Me: "I had wondered about all those purple and gold shorts you have."

Security through obscenity?

(We were listening to the radio show, "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me", as Paula Poundstone goes on a mini-rant about passwords.)
Paula Poundstone: "I cannot come up with any more passwords.  It's why I have 16 cats."
Her: "So, Useless Information Man, is that why you know so many porn performer names?"
Me: "I assure you, when I started down that road of depravity in fall of 1987, computer security was not one of my concerns."

Dream worriers

Frage: "I had the weirdest dream this morning."
UIM: "I'm sorry."
Frage: "I was pregnant, and due.  You were pushing people out of the way to get me to a doctor."
UIM: "Good.  I would be doing that."
Frage: "And the doctor said, sorry, we're only delivering twenty babies today."
UIM: "You've got to stop reading your dad's Obama rants."

Sign language.

(This compresses and streamlines three different conversations over a couple of days.)
Her: "Yes, you think you are hilarious."
Me: "Maybe for Christmas, I should get you a nice set of signs, so you can save your voice for important stuff."
Her: "What?"
Me: "Well, you know, such as 'Yes, you've told this anecdote before.'"
Her: "Could be useful."
Me: (Mimes holding up independent signs.) "'He think's he funny; we're not sure why.'  'Oh my god, please stop singing.'"
Her: "Ooh!  That would be good."
Me: "'No one wants to hear that old comedy routine.'"
Her: "Keep going, you're talking me into it."
Me:"'Thank you, Useless Information Man.'"
Her: "Of course, there's two flaws with this plan."
Me: "One: I never follow through on any of my plans."
Her: "And Two: none of these signs would stop you in the slightest."
Me: (Mock-sweet-and-cute) "Thank you for loving me just the way I am."
Her: (Mimes holding up a sign.) "Yes, you think you are hilarious."

We work well together.

As my sweetheart and I walked along Lawrence Avenue, on our way to get llunch and to do errands, we passed a taqueria that had "Free-Wifi" and "Special Taco $1.50 Tuesday and Thursday" signs stacked too close together in the window.

Me: "Free wi-fi special taco."
Her: "What?"
Me: "The signs in the window.  I don't know what a wi-fi taco would be."
Her: "Of course."
Me: "I don't even know how one could eat a digital taco."
Her: "Open your mouth really wide."
Me: "Man, worst superhero name ever."
Her: "Open your mouth really wide?"
Me: "I meant 'Digital Taco' ."
Her: "My suggestion is worse."
Me: "But superhero names are never imperative sentences.  Nobody is going to trust 'Captain Let's Get the Hell Out of Here.' Or the superhero invoked by all kids traveling with siblings, 'The Amazing Stop Touching Me Stop Touching Me Mom Make Him Stop Touching Me' ."

October visit to Southern California

We're standing on the Santa Monica pier, with the temp in the low 70s.
Me: "So, wait, it's still October here in California?"
Her: "Yes, dear."
Me: "Okay, I can finally understand why people tolerate the earthquakes, mudslides, and wildfires."

Tear the roof off the sucker.

17 Oct 2013
(Frage and UIM are walking down the street.)
Frage: "Weee got the funk."
Frage and UIM: "Gotta have that funk. Weeee need the funk.  Gotta get that funk."
UIM: "Got a real kind of thing going down getting down, there's a whole lot of rhythm goin round."
Frage: "See, lyrics are your shiny object.  I just have to say one line and it distracts you."
UIM: "Yes, but it's sort of entrapment, because you get annoyed when I continue."
Frage: "Well, I'd like you to finish sooner.  Me, one line, and I'm done."
UIM: "It happens a lot as we get older."
Frage: "Let's stop calling me old, okay?"
UIM: "We're both old.  We're just two years away from telling kids to put down their Nintendos and get off our lawns."
Frage: "We've always been like that.  That's not age; it's a personality crack."
UIM: "Which is better than a crack personality."

when people ask me how it's going, I feel like telling them this.

So, yes, cartoon-watching is still an important part of this relationship.

We caught some of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle series, and the writing is good, so we are catching up on it.  (I never watched any of the old series, so I don’t know how much the writing has improved.)

Shortly into the second episode that we saw together, this conversation occurred:

Her: “Wait, this show seems so familiar.” 
(Pause.)
Her: “It feels kind of like talking with you.”
UIM: “Huh?”
Her: “Each of them is like a different part of you.  There’s the angry guy, and the guy who uses big words, and the guy who thinks he’s in charge, and the guy who just says random silly things.”
UIM: “Okay.  Yeah.  That’s a pretty fair assessment.”

Para-Nerds

Frage: “Well, you know me.  I’m paranoid.”

UIM: “As am I.  Taking a moment to nail down concrete evidence helps diminish the paranoia.”

Frage: “But the evidence suggests that They Really Are Out to Get Us.”

UIM: “In which case, concrete evidence helps us survive, and plan our counter-attack.”

On the upside of a downward spiral?

(Frage and UIM are in a Dunkin Donuts at 5:30 am, waiting for the morning commuter train.)
(The radio is playing the song "Drive-By" by the band Train.)
Frage: (glaring at the speakers) "It's just disturbing that this is supposed to be a love song, but in terms of a random violent act."
UIM: "But, it's saying that it's NOT a drive-by."
Frage: "Adding the word 'not' doesn't make it better."
UIM: "Sadly, some guys' attitude for romance is exactly like their attitude for random violence.  Get in, get out, hope the police don't get involved."
Frage: "For a second, I thought you said, 'Hump the police.' "
UIM: "Yeah, that was NWA's first draft.  Same way they originally wrote '911 is a Mildly Amusing Anecdote' before they realized they needed to be more direct."
(Pause, and Frage glares at the speakers again.)
Frage: "It's still just wrong."
UIM: "It's not as bad as 'This is not a conspiracy to commit murder,' or 'This is not a serial killing spree.' "
Frage: "It is, because you're killing my patience."