Do You Know Someone Who Feigns Incompetence?

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

I think my title is self-explanatory, but I am going to tell you my definition of what a person acts likes who suffers from this disorder just to make sure we have no confusion. The symptoms of Feigned or Practiced Incompetence seem to be brought on when the person afflicted with this disorder is asked to do simple tasks by a loved one.  They appear confused, befuddled, and unable to complete the task at hand even though they have been fully trained by the requestor.  They can be wily and self-serving and usually appear hard of hearing. People with this disorder come in all shapes and sizes. You may be married to one, given birth to one, or even live with someone with this problem. They can be armed and dangerous when asked to pitch in or multi-task. Please use caution when dealing with these individuals.

Has anyone ever seen the episode of Everybody Loves Raymond where Ray tells Robert to start doing things wrong so that Amy (his wife to be) stops asking him to help and just does it herself? Ray has a whole system designed to get out of helping around the house.  A couple of years ago at our family beach vacation, my brother-in-law broke the man code and admitted he has a system called Practiced Incompetence that has over the years worked quite nicely for him in getting him out of household duties.  I once saw him pack their van for their trip home from our house, while my sister-in-law was on the phone handling work business.  When he finished packing, half of their stuff was still sitting in our driveway when he declared he couldn’t get anything more in the van. He had this Practiced Incompetence thing down to an art form.  After a while, my sister-in-law happened to look out the window during the call, saw the results of his efforts, promptly cut the call short, and uttered a very bad word, using it as both a noun and an adjective, in some very loud sentences. They ended up borrowing our car top carrier for the ride home and I don’t think I have ever heard my brother-in-law asked to pack the van again.

Well, last night, yet again, we played our own version of this game. For many years now, my husband has always been the last one to come to bed. I used to ask every night, “Did you lock all the doors?” Almost every night after I asked the question, he would get this perplexed look on his face like this is the first time he had ever heard such a thing needed to be done and say, “I think I locked the doors.”  Now, I am not a detective, but I have watched enough episodes of Monk to know that when a person uses the word think in a sentence, hesitates while answering, avoids all eye contact, and has a look akin to a deer caught in the headlights plastered on his face, there is not a chance in you know what the door is locked and he knows it.

This theory has proved correct 90% of the times I have gotten up to double check that the door is indeed locked, although the jury is still out about the basement door that was technically locked one night, but still ajar. Once, I asked him how he would feel if an intruder got in through the unlocked door and kidnapped me and he never saw me again all because he forgot to lock a stupid door.   He pretended he was crying and said he would be very sad, but he and my daughter were high fiving each other and dancing around.  All I know is if someone breaks in and kills us, the last words my husband is going to hear as he is heading for the white light will be, “I told you to lock the damn door!

Which finally brings me to my point. My dogs have a routine. Every night, without fail, I walk the dogs after dinner. I am like the postman; I get the job done in all kinds of weather. If they don’t get this walk, it is a very long night because Vern is relentless in coming around and letting you know we did not follow the schedule. We have discussed this on end about how important that nightly walk is for our mental health and Vern’s well being. On some Thursdays, I meet friends in another town for dinner and my husband is home with the dogs.  Last night I got home and said, “Did the dogs get their walk?”  “What walk?” he asked and told me he had played with them instead.  Houston, we have a problem! I have tried to tell him before that kids and/or dogs do not really call “watch Daddy read a book” playtime and to come up with something else that actually makes them tired. Fudge and Vern were all but standing by my van holding their leashes and poop bags, so I loaded them up and took them to the park. 

Later that night, we had a terrible storm.  Again, my husband is the last one to come to bed.  Every single night, he comes to bed, turns the light out, and within 30 seconds Vern is beside the bed and has to go out for his last potty of the night. One night, I asked him why he didn’t take the dogs out right before he came to bed and he said, “when did we start doing that?” I calculated backwards in my head and said, “We brought Fudge home on 3/13/09, so we started doing it on 3/13/09,” and he looked shocked. This particular night, probably because he was lulled to sleep by the high winds, thunder, and tree branches banging against our windows, he was able to fall asleep in that 30 second window from the time he turned the light out to Vern’s nightly reminder that he needed to go out.  It was a miracle how his deep sleep coincided with that storm. Vern, meanwhile, was not taking no for an answer so it was left to me to brave the weather and get him outside.

Luckily, we were able to dodge the falling limbs and I weigh too much for the high winds to carry me away, because I knew no one inside our bedroom was ever going to admit to anything and come looking for me if I didn’t return. If something had happened, I could see the morning headlines now, “Woman Found Crushed by Tree in Storm. Husband Still Faking Sleep when Police Arrived.”  When I got back to our bedroom sopping wet, I thought about standing over top of him and yelling, “I won the wet T-shirt contest!” but I was too wet and tired and just knew he would say something like, “why are you all wet?” in his sleepiest sounding voice.


Well, I took some notes and one night when my husband and I sat down to dinner, he asked what I was calling this dish we were about to eat.  I said, “How about Blackened Chicken?” and he said, “How about going out to dinner?” and I said that sounded great. I think with more practice, I am going to get the hang of this Practiced Incompetence thing down.

[Jennifer,Chloe & Myla]

Oh boy...I loved this one!!! You are so honest in a round about funny way! I'll be straight forward and tell you that I live with inspector gadget until I ask him to look for something or get something out of a drawer or help with the laundry, etc. He can spot a speck of something on the carpet, find a smudge on the tv screen while it's turned on,

give great detail about where some dog poop is on the sidewalk in our neighborhood, see a nail in someone else's tire, I can go on and on. But when I ask him to get the clear ruler that is 12" long tucked on the right side

of the basket in the left hand drawer of the hutch in the dining area, the left big drawer not top small drawer...he CANNOT find it!! Drives me "CRAZY!" I just know that it's easier if I just do these things by myself, I give up!

 

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Sue, I like the way you think :) LOL

[Sue, Lola, Pongo & Hubby]

My DH has this little "skill" down pat as well. I'm not going to get into details because I'll just get mad and DH will wonder why I'm so mad at him when we talk next. You should have changed your shirt, and rung the wet one out on his sleepy face!! LOL

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Angie, I loved your comment. Thank you! Poor Hudson. We had a dog that hated storms and she sensed them coming and barked non-stop until it was over. I hated to hear on the weather channel that a storm was brewing!

Linda, For me, it happens, because I am Type A and unable to delegate. My husband knows my weaknesses....LOL! Thank you!

Camilla, I can believe anything you write about your DH, but not that sweet Darwin. It was a fluke, I tell ya!!

Barbie, LOL....I had a talking Snowman that I kept in the bathroom and left it on to scare Vern to stop drinking out of the toilet. The first time the thing talked, Vern came out of the bathroom like a bat out of hell.

 

[Barbie]

On the toilet paper problem, I just remembered the "talking spindle". A few days ago, I had planned to buy one from Northern Tool (you can record a message in your own voice) to teach Zeus not to mess with the TP. This would've been perfect, as I cannot watch his every move, but I managed to catch him in the act twice and he leaves it alone now. However, this would be perfect to "train" your hubby and kids to replace the roll. Just record anything you want to say, and they'll hear it when they start pulling TP off the roll.

[Camilla and Darwin]

DH does this constantly! I will tell him I have to go to a store, while out running errands. If it's a store he doesn't like (basically any clothing store) he will "forget" to take the turn. EVERY SINGLE TIME. Gah! It makes me so mad, I know he is faking it. Now I have to remind him like 30 times, just so he can't pretend to miss the turn. ha ha. 

 

Darwin does this too. He'll sneak over to the garbage can, and when you say "no!" he veers off casually, as if he just accidentally walked by it, it wasn't where he was headed at all. :-)

[Linda, Webber and Seda]

Well, Laurie, you have done it yet again!  I love your blogs so much.  This disorder must be some kind of a man secret.  Someone has told them if they do a really horrible job, or said they did the job but didn't, that the competent, ever vigilant, nurturing woman will make everything right.  And we do. What's up with that!

[Angie, Hudson and Lily]

Loved the picture! It reminded me of some of my late night/all kinds of weather doggie potty trips! Hudson is so scared of storms, that he would rather sleep with his legs crossed and hold it all night, than braving any hint of a storm. Once it starts he refuses to go out for awhile even after it has stopped. My husband loves the dogs, but their care is pretty much up to me, and like you, I could be blown away in a tornado, lost in a blinding blizzard, etc and he wouldn't know I was missing until morning- possibly much later..... I think men really perfected the whole incompetent thing when it comes to raising kids. How convenient for them. :)

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Nancy, Don't you wonder how they think sometimes? Hopefully, it gets easier!

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Don't even get me started about our 23 year-old baby!  He had a fix it ticket - he fixed the problem - i.e. put the license plate back on the front of his car and figured that took care of it!  He never took it to get checked off so the $41 ticket cost ME $301.  Why did I pay it? Because it was registered to me. Or how about that I left HIM to pay for renewing his license.  He did and in a timely fashion, however he bounced the check so it will cost him double.  Will I pay it? Perhaps - again he is on our insurance and the cars he drives are registered to me.  Oddly, when he got a fix-it ticket on his motorcycle, he appropriately took care of it!  Why? Because it is not registered or insured by me?  How stupid am I?