Val Has Cooled Down to Boiling Mad

"The time has come," the Valrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of Hick, and ire, and family cash,
And trouble that he brings,
And why Valrus is boiling hot...
Whose neck she'd like to wring."

Yeah. The time has come. I'm ready to talk about Hick's latest (major) transgression. I have cooled off to boiling hot, several hundred degrees down from molten steel.

Way back on April 25th (that's how long Val has been holding this in), Genius asked by text:

"Do you know if Pa has or could acquire easily a spare riding mower? Our yard is too large to be managable (his spelling, heh, heh) with a push mower." Yeah. Genius even texts all fancy-like.

This was while Hick was in France, unable to use his phone, and  was borrowing his buddy Heinz's phone. You remember...Heinz, the German dude from Switzerland.

I did not know of any spare mowers, since Genius took his push mower with him when he rented that house in College Town. I told him he'd have to wait until Hick was home, and that Hick could probably find one at the auction, or a used one at The Family Center. Hick bought one there last year for us, for around $800, after the one he paid my grandma $800 for (on the day before I was going to buy a new laptop) quit working a couple years later.

So...Hick came home from France. He was as grouchy as an ol' barrrr, as Loretty told Doo in A Coal Miner's Daughter. He picked a fight over something trivial. Can't even remember that part. I know it was on a Saturday, and I was in the kitchen with my hands in some kind of food preparation, and he started yelling behind me at the cutting block, and then took off. Good riddance! It's so easy to storm out and return to a complete meal.

Later that evening, The Pony and I were on the front porch with Puppy Jack. We'd only had him a week at that time. We heard Hick in the BARn field mowing. I couldn't tell by the sound if he was on the mower, or one of his TWO tractors. The John Deere that he was supposed to sell when he bought the $10,000 New Holland at the state surplus equipment auction.

We didn't want to let Jack down in the grass to run around in case Hick came mowing over in the front yard/field. Because, you know, Jack is not very big, and hard to see.

There here came Hick on the mower, across from one field to the other, on the gravel road by his ShackyTown, and parked in the front yard to talk to us on the porch. Something was off. I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Then it hit me. That mower was bright yellow.

 "When did we get THAT mower?"

"Today."

"What?"

"I got it today."

"THAT's where you went? You took off mad, and came back with a new riding mower?"

"I told Genius he could have the old one."

"OLD? You bought it last summer! How is it OLD?"

"It was used when I bought it, Val."

"How much did you pay for it last year?"

"Eight hundred dollars."

"And you barely used it! Only one summer. Half a summer! What about that one you paid my grandma $800 for?"

"It broke down. So I got the other one. Now I gave it to Genius. I'm driving it out to him tomorrow."

"Isn't he going to PAY anything for it?"

"No. I told him he could have it."

"What happens to it when he moves?"

"I don't know. We'll see when he moves."

"How much did THIS one cost?"

"Seventeen hundred dollars."

"SEVENTEEN HUNDRED DOLLARS? And you didn't even discuss it with me?"

"No. We needed a mower."

"Because you gave the one you bought LAST summer to Genius! And you didn't discuss THAT with me, either!"

So Hick fired up his brand new Cub Cadet XT1 Enduro Series LT 46 in. 22 HP V-Twin Kohler Hydrostatic Gas Front-Engine Riding Mower-LT46, and mowed off into the sunset rather than discuss his misappropriation of family funds.

Am I the bad guy to think that a purchase of $1700.00 is something that one spouse would discuss with the other before plopping down the cash?

Let me answer for you: NO!