Queen of the castle

You know, sometimes I wonder how the Carpenter manages to control his manly urges when he’s around me day after day.

After more than 20 years together, it is truly a testament to his self control that he can stay so far on the other end of the large L-shaped couch away from me, especially when I look as hot as I do every night.

Remember in the black and white movies when the seductive female would tell her leading man to wait while she “slipped into something a little more comfortable?” And then she would emerge in a sultry outfit and bam! - that guy was a goner. She had him wrapped around her little finger.

Generations of men bought into the idea that when a woman said those words, it really meant she was going into her room to slip into something sexy. Yeah, so ... that ain’t happening in this house.

I can only assure you my idea of something more comfortable usually involves baggy pants that require a draw string and if I’m really lucky, I find a sweater that is so stretched from wear that I could probably stuff a few more layers underneath it. You know, to round out my curves (I say curves because lumps isn’t really as nice a term).

I always say, “A girl can’t go wrong in flannel.” On special occasions, I snazzy up with zebra striped jammies, (special occasions being rent-a-movie nights).

Now that summer has gone and the furnace will soon be on, I have pulled out the real show stopper in this sexy clothing attire: the fluffy pink polka-dot socks. Oh yeah, baby. They are just so soft and squishy, and you know what they say: warm feet, warm heart (and a vat of chip dip and maybe a nice bag of ripple chips).

Well, at least that’s what I tell the Carpenter, yet he still seems pretty content all the way over there on the other side of the couch.

Sometimes I shake my sweater so the chip crumbs fall off before I wave at him from my end of the couch. I call it flirting. Always the gentleman, he has such control against my animal magnetism.

A famous Hollywood actress once said that they key to a happy marriage was to always look pretty for your spouse.

She was divorced, so I guess she was talking from experience. I appreciate her advice, I really do, and if I had her salary, her home in the Hollywood Hills, and a nanny, housekeeper and personal assistant, I’m pretty sure I’d dress much nicer too.

Heck, I’d even have my own couch and the Carpenter and I wouldn’t have to share one at all.

But I’m no actress. I’m the real deal, the same take-me-as-you-find-me girl the Carpenter fell for all those years ago. There is just more of me to love, ahem (note: curves, not lumps).

When I come home from work, the grocery store, the dance studio/hockey arena/dress rehearsal/volunteer gig, I like to slip into something more comfortable that fully expresses the real me: Queen of my castle, relaxed and not the least bit self conscious. It’s a total turn on, I know. Warm feet, warm heart.

That’s how I render the Carpenter speechless, night after night. Yep. I’m that good.