Liina Vikerkaar Vello says I’m not funny though I sometimes say funny things. When we recently drove past an outdoor advertisement which claimed Estonia was number two in eurodrinking, I remarked to Vello that I was glad my countrymen were the top of the heap in something. Vello didn’t laugh, but I saw him write it down. I’ll bet you he’ll later use it in a story and take credit for it. But I love him, so I don’t mind.
I often tell him that he’s not funny though he does funny things. Just the other day he spent fifteen minutes in the kitchen pretending like he had his own cooking television show. He addressed make-believe cameras on the other side of the stove, gave recipe hints to his “home viewers,” and suggested techniques to improve use of the spatula. And all he was doing was heating up some fish fingers. Only he could take something so mundane and turn it into, well, something equally mundane that we all somehow pay attention to. For the record, though, I don’t think his cooking show has a future.
I honestly don’t know if other women’s husbands exhibit the same odd behavior, but so far Vello doesn’t appear to be a danger to himself or others. There’s a Canadian expression that says talking to yourself is normal, but when you start answering yourself then it’s a problem. I asked Vello if he didn’t think talking to imaginary TV viewers was borderline behavior, and he looked at me like I was the crazy one and replied, “but you should read the letters they send.” He then turned away with a terribly sad look on his face.
Despite his rather odd behavior, Vello and I agree on many things. There are other issues where we’ve agreed to disagree. Like my vegetarianism. Whenever he eats at home, which is often, it’s always vegetarian food. I’d like to think this is out of respect for my beliefs, but it’s really because he’s too lazy to cook anything for himself. If I suddenly started facing east five times each day and chanting passages from the Koran, it wouldn’t startle him. He’d probably join right in if it meant getting to eat sooner.
When we go out to dinner parties, he has this habit of falling asleep around ten p.m. He’ll wander off with a full belly, find a comfortable chair, and close his eyes. It’s not that he finds the conversation boring, he just likes to get up early and “milk the cows,” as he says. He’s never lived on a farm, though. And he really doesn’t get up that early. Friends find it charming that he falls asleep. He’s able to get away with a lot.
Vello also likes to talk about his days in the Canadian Army.
Read on at Vello’s blog:
http://vellovikerkaar.blogspot... 