I’ve decided that the courts need to not only allow, but perhaps even mandate, brains to marry one another.
Why? Because of smoke alarm batteries.
That isn’t clear? Oh. Let me explain.
The other night, right about 3am, a battery in one of our smoke alarms went out. So, of course, it began its beeping, once every 30 seconds or so. After penetrating my dreams, waking me, and getting me up, I raced about the house, every shrill beep being the one that might wake the baby.
BEEP! Race to a part of the house. Wait. BEEP! Race to another part of the house. Wait. BEEP! Back to the previous part of the house, rip down smoke alarm and pull out the battery like I’m a barbarian pulling the heart from a defeated foe. Wait. BEEP! Damn! Race to other part of the house…
Your reign of terror is over, Smoke Alarm! …Do you smell smoke?
Once it was done I threw the alarm and battery on the counter and went back to bed so I could lie there, angrily not sleeping for the rest of the night.
Now, logically, in the morning I should replace the battery, but I don’t. Why? “Oh no, you go to hell smoke alarm. I am not doing that again in a year. I’d rather the house burns down!” Now, of course I don’t mean that, right? Of course not. Yet my emotional/base self is so mad at the smoke alarm, I just want it to lie there, helpless.
And that just gets to the essence of what’s wrong with our brains. We often know the best course of action, but don’t take it because our logical brain can’t compete with the base part of our brains.
“Hm, this political candidate is educated, and has a lot of experience. He could make incremental, but meaningful, improvements to the country. But he thinks that makes him all fancy. The other candidate seems like a great guy! I’d like to have a beer with him! What are his political beliefs? Oh, God, really? Yikes. Well, whatever. He cracks me up, this guy! Let’s give him a lot of power! Let’s give him all the power!”
Our brains need another brain – a spouse brain, to call them on their crap.
“Hey! Tax refund!” says You Brain. “I can make a serious dent in our credit card bill with this… or… I can buy an electric guitar!”
But, Spouse Brain, what if it’s – and stay with me here – a really, really *cool* guitar?
“No, that’s dumb,” says Spouse Brain.
“But, I’ve always wanted to learn guitar. Or at least, I’ve always wanted to be an amazing guitar player. And what if I decide to learn guitar and don’t have one? Yes. Yes, I will buy a guitar.”
“Oh no, you won’t. You pay the credit card bill.”
See? Spouse Brain not only isn’t emotionally invested/blinded, it’s sick of You Brain’s nonsense!
So when You Brain thinks, “Hey! I think Sarah Palin winked at me through the TV!” Spouse Brain says, “She didn’t. You’re both idiots.”
When You Brain thinks, “I’m hungry, and dinner isn’t for another 8 minutes. I should eat an entire carrot cake.” Spouse Brain says, “Okay, remember last time you did that? You regretted it, didn’t you.”
When You Brain thinks, “Stupid smoke alarm. No battery for you. I hate you.” Spouse Brain can say, “Or, put in a new battery, and put in the calendar to change it six months, before it dies.”
Of course, both You Brain and Spouse Brain know that won’t happen… so it’s a flawed system.
“I love you for your mind.” “Of course you do. I’m a brain.”
The Byronic Man 
May 11, 2015 at 7:12 am
“Oh, yeah!” to quote Kool-Aid Pitcher. I can so relate!
May 11, 2015 at 2:43 pm
I’d be curious to know how often people have fires and have to admit the alarms were all dead.
May 13, 2015 at 2:38 am
Regarding deaths in home fires:
“One-quarter (23%) of the deaths were caused by fires in properties in which smoke alarms were present but failed to operate.”
Extrapolate from this as you wish.
May 11, 2015 at 7:14 am
The dead smoke detector battery is the worst thing ever. So we can put a human on the moon but we can’t make smoke detectors more efficient. Build them into smartphones, because NOBODY forgets to charge those puppies.
May 11, 2015 at 7:54 am
Brilliant idea.
May 11, 2015 at 2:45 pm
We actually lost half our house some years ago in a fire, and when they rebuilt, the new alarms were wired in to the house. I was overjoyed… until the builder explained that they still have batteries for when the power goes out. Damn it!
May 11, 2015 at 7:44 am
At least you didn’t think it was a trapped bird in the attic as friend of mine did and got the council guy out!
May 11, 2015 at 1:17 pm
“I’ve got a bird trapped – you know, that bird that chirps once exactly every 60 seconds? Only has one pitch?”
May 11, 2015 at 1:22 pm
Could be a battery hen (groan, I’ll leave now!!) 🙂
May 11, 2015 at 7:53 am
I always go with the politician that has the best hair. Is this wrong?
Once my mom killed her smoke alarm with a broom. I could hear her yelling as it was beeping like mad. I went over to see if I could help her and when I saw she was smashing it to bits I said, “Carry on.”
May 11, 2015 at 2:47 pm
I think it’s important to hear what the candidate thinks about real issues, like whether he/she thinks freedom is a good thing or a bad thing. And if they like families.
May 11, 2015 at 9:17 am
This post actually reminded me to set an alert on my phone for when I get home tonight to “get driver’s license from bike bag…idiot. And good job driving to work without your license.” So thank you, and you’re welcome for turning this post into a living work of art.
May 11, 2015 at 2:51 pm
I recently finally got our new car insurance card in the glove box after weeks – weeks – of it going from pants pocket to wallet to satchel to pocket, always with the idea that I was “on my way” to put it in the car. It looks like a used kleenex at this point.
May 11, 2015 at 10:15 am
But you brain would say, ” if you let me get a new guitar, you (spouse wife) can have those Manolo Blahnik shoes youve been eyeing.” Both brains win.
May 11, 2015 at 10:16 am
Of course, credit card is still hurting.
May 11, 2015 at 2:52 pm
Yeah, but that’s Financial Planner Brain’s problem.
May 11, 2015 at 11:45 am
I got rid of the smoke alarm in the kitchen because the kitchen hood cannot handle the husband’s cooking. As long as the fire starts someplace innocuous like a bedroom or bathroom, we’re good. Also because the fire extinguisher in the kitchen has already been used. Would’ve been replaced if I had a spouse brain, right?
May 11, 2015 at 2:53 pm
Come to think of it, I think my extinguishers are about 10 years old at this point…
May 11, 2015 at 2:41 pm
If a smoke detector can detect impending doom, why the hell can’t it detect nightfall? They always start beeping in the middle of the damn night — why didn’t they get all chatty in the morning when I NEED to get up?
May 11, 2015 at 2:51 pm
Yeah, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard one go out during the day.
May 11, 2015 at 3:27 pm
That’s pweposterous, never the bwain should meet! …You see what I did there, with the “w’s”? You know like “brain” only I wanted it to sound like “twain” so it would be the funniest thing on the internet. Some people don’t know this, but I’m much more clever than I think.
May 11, 2015 at 5:43 pm
Those smoke detectors are obnoxious with their Beep Beeping, especially during cooking when I’m burning stuff. What happens if one of the brains goes missing during the partnership? What then? I just know you have all the answers.
May 12, 2015 at 3:10 am
I will admit I’ve sat on my stairs, in the middle of the night, close to tears trying to figure out which one was beeping. Those tears quickly turned to murderous thoughts. Who will it be … the snoring husband or the smoke alarm? It wasn’t easy and this is not being written from a prison cell.
I loved that your brain went right to a Les Paul … hahaha!
May 12, 2015 at 7:43 am
I remember learning about old west outlaw John Wesley Harding who shot a man just for snoring. I remember thinking, “Sure, sure. And…? Oh, is that not a reasonable response?”
May 12, 2015 at 7:50 am
Don’t get me started on smoke alarms. How could something designed to save us be so aggravating? But on to brain + brain: what every marriage needs is a third party, perhaps a parent or child, to demonstrate the follies of not doing what brain 1 and/or 2 advises. Follow through more likely with the potential reward of future smugness.
May 12, 2015 at 10:58 am
So brain, brain, and “control-group brain”. This is going to be a complicated ceremony.
May 12, 2015 at 8:43 am
Interesting theory, but it breaks down if, instead of opposite brains attracting, you go with one just like yours. Then you’d wind up charging your credit card for two, ultra-cool Les Pauls…which you’ll lose in your impending house fire.
May 12, 2015 at 10:57 am
Maybe – although I tend to get most irritated with people who are most like me… but maybe that’s my own stuff.
May 12, 2015 at 10:18 am
The contractors who finished out basement (bastards) sealed an old smoke alarm inside the box/encasement which housed one of our water pipes. Of course that sucker drove us crazy when it died because we couldn’t figure out where in the sevenhells the beeps were coming from! I wanted to start ripping up floorboards…
May 12, 2015 at 10:56 am
It’s like a modern version of “The Tell-Tale Heart”!
“It is the beeping of its hideous battery!”
May 12, 2015 at 11:28 am
(Telltale MORON is more like it…)
Poe is one of my all-time faves. I had to wait until I was 12 to read him; at my father’s insistence.
May 13, 2015 at 2:42 am
This cannot have been done by accident, even by the most idiotic of workers. I imagine the gang choked down snorts as they imagined the future fun their devious act would one day reap.
May 13, 2015 at 6:42 am
Nope. They were morons. My husband was away on a business trip and they finished the first day of demo by leaving my front-facing window completely OPEN after ripping it out. We have coyotes and crazies – it’s not-so-far upstate NY – just 1 county north of Westchester. We were so pissed.
May 13, 2015 at 6:57 am
Let’s see–I’ve been away so long–would that be Poughkeepsie? Is that the county as well as the city?
Yup. Sound like morons, all right!
May 14, 2015 at 1:30 pm
The only thing worse than having to replace the batteries in beeping, bleeping smoke alarms is having hard-wired alarms that never do anything, until the power goes out, and then they start chirping. And yes, I let spouse brain tear the whole thing out when it was light, the next day. Two years later, the alarm somehow threw itself off the top of the wall. Seeking revenge, I guess.
I’m still following you while on vacation in France.
June 18, 2016 at 7:35 am
….And those alarms always go off in the middle of the night, don’t they!?