Dating : Some Of The Weird Things All Couples Do

Not just baby, honey, sugar, or boo, but a whole slew of silliness we evolve to.

Here’s a mere subset of nicknames I use to address my partner on a regular, rotational basis: biscuit, skillet, cricket, kitten, kittens (plural), and lastly, Pacha (from the 2000 Disney epic The Emperor’s New Groove starring David Spade and John Goodman, which makes no sense at all (especially since I also use it in reference to one of his cars), but idgaf.) People are weird.

For weeks after we watched the movie Up (and really for years, but more sporadically, afterwards), we would make the “Kevin” bird sound to each other from across a room. We also whimper, growl, groan, “hmph,” and make a whole myriad of other noises at each other in lieu of human words. My brother and his high school girlfriend spoke almost exclusively in baby voices.

My boyfriend and I do this a lot. He only endures the rom-coms, but he does actually like the rosé.

Not “which of my friends would you sleep with?” That’s not what this is.

More like, “If our cat was the U.S. poet laureate, where would she draw her inspiration from? What would she write about?”

Or “if you had to live inside a letter of the alphabet, which letter would you choose?”

Or “if you were a bunch of flowers, what kind of flowers and how many would you be?”

Every woman I’ve ever known does this with her partner, and every straight dude I’ve ever talked to about it says his partner does it, too.

It’s so ubiquitous that whenever I see a dude with a stray ear hair, I can’t help but think, “oh no, this man is not loved! Where is his partner on this shit? Is he having troubles at home? Oh my god, he might as well have come in here with a 2-day beard and yesterday’s clothes, maybe a t-shirt that says ‘i need help.’”

It’s unfair and totally not rational, but I still think it. (And if you’re wondering why is his partner responsible? why can’t he tweeze his own hairs? The answer is: they’re not; of course he is and of course he can. But there are angles and non-bathroom lighting that just make some hairs easier for others to see.)

Mostly centering around pooping and farting, but also moles and hemorrhoids and piss and vomit and a lot of other gross shit.

Tbh this isn’t my fave flavor of weirdness so I can’t really add color to what the rest of you wackos are doing or why. But I hear you are and that you’re the majority, and frankly that’s detail enough.

Especially right after hanging out —bc omg what the hell was Ed’s deal tonight, amirite? Which everyone knows is like 33% of why we all hang out anyway.

Like when either my boyfriend or I follow up with the phase “the maple kind” when one of us says “yeah?” (which, uh, happens all the time), a reference to the now almost-10-year-old video of that “talking” dog.

…or walk, or sleep, or blink, or breathe.

A friend once told me she “loved” (clearly meaning: hated) the way I use a spoon. I used to get irrationally annoyed about the way my mom (seemingly willfully) mispronounces both “Chipotle” and “Qdoba.”

These pet peeves are the sort of luxuries we make up with one another.

As a self-respecting Average Woman, one of my personal favorite moves is obviously to put my cold hands and/or feet on my boyfriend’s body. (I mean, come on, this is a big perk of dating!) With this guy, though, the main satisfaction here isn’t just getting warm, nor is it just his reaction of “wow, your [feet/hands] are freezing!” It’s also the fact that each time he says it, he’s got this tone of total surprise over it, like he’s willfully overlooking every other time it’s happened, truly wanting to believe that maybe this time I just didn’t know. In other words: he is angel-pure innocence and it just slays me.

My other favorites include:

• Pretending those rom-coms we watch are really “for him” and not me
• Playing a song on repeat until he notices
• Putting pop country music on in the car anytime we go somewhere
• Reminding him that his once-edgy favorite pop punk bands are now dudes in their 40s still singing the same songs on “reunion” tours (at which he laughs in response and then sometimes reminds me: at least it’s not county, which he’s pretty sure has always been bad and was never “good” even to begin with.)
• Crawling onto him like tiny hill to wake him up when he sleeps in ‘til noon
• Pretending (and acting mock surprised) that something I know he hates “doesn’t bother him” (i.e., while riding in the car: “I’m just shocked you don’t mind all this traffic! This traffic would drive me totally insane.”)
• I used to lick the side of his face just a lil bit sometimes, but he hated it legitimately and not in a fun way, so I had to stop.

My boyfriend’s and my favorite target is his brother.

The guy is one of those “real uptight MFers,” so we like to blow up his life with frilly decorative pillows, scented candles, stuffed animals, Christmas music, and cookies, to name a few… and the only thing better than how freaking pissed he gets are those few moments when he actually likes the thing (such as the stuffed animal he still has in his room), admitting what we all already know to be true: he’s really a jelly bean deep down inside.

Because theirs looked / tasted better.

Man, sometimes that “last” bite will go on longer than rest of the entire meal, each of us taking smaller and smaller bites, trying to pass the “last” one off for the person to enjoy and finish. It’s stupid but we still do it. He always gives in.

I once wore one of my boyfriend’s new sweatshirts so much right after he got it that within a few months he actually thought it had been mine all along. And he once wore one of my (loose-fitting) sweatshirts out with friends, who immediately recognized it as mine and tried to call him out on it. He looked down, back up at them, then shrugged and was like, “yep.” Because couples, they do not care.

One mystery that’s outstanding for me, however, is the fine line of whether dudes actually hate this and, if so, how much. Because for all their hushed, back-of-house complaining, I just wanna mention that I (like most women) am pretty convinced it’s all a front. The only exception being a favorite hoodie or a breakup, and especially both.

Every long-term boyfriend I’ve ever had has let me paint his toenails at least once. (I do let them pick the color — I’m not a monster.) But every single one of them fought me vehemently beforehand because they were all convinced no other dude, anywhere, would ever agree to endure such horrendous abuse.

I’m pretty sure this, like tweezing hairs and popping pimples and dudes being little spoon, is way more common than people realize.

I mean, if you didn’t snag a handful while getting up to grab a drink, did you even walk by at all??

That’s it. You just… lay there.

If you’ve never experienced this, you’re missing out. It’s like spooning on crack. It’s like a weighted blanket on crack. It’s great after a long day.

Our favorites, by far, are his cars (one of which is a bit of a “fuck boy” and the other of which has a heart of gold and always tries his best, so some of the best dialogues are those we imagine happening between them in the garage.)

If you’re not as weird (i.e., just have more at your disposal), you just make up voices and dialogues for your pet(s.)

You know the ones.

Our favorites, by far, are other drivers — “gotta be careful” one of us will say, watching a minivan take a turn at 3 mph, or “it came outta nowhere!” to mock the explanation we think would be offered by someone who ran into a pole. We also target our neighbors, and especially their dogs, out for walks and runs on the highly-frequented path near our apartment building.

One of my favorite running bits we do is an elderly couple, whose names and personalities often change but who almost always pop up in the car.

Like Natalie Portman’s manic pixie dream girl rendition in Garden State.

My sister, who’s such a normal person it’s a bit unnerving, sometimes “runs” bow-legged in the privacy of her own home while in the company of those she loves and trusts (well, and me, apparently.)

Bonus points for anybody who tries to pass these things off as “sexy.” lol.

Like the running list of action films he watches, or the depressing sad shit I watch. Then there’s the generic “bachelor” meals of, I don’t know, huge steaks and beer, as well as whatever food you partner doesn’t like but you do.