Vickmeister sent me a link on dealing with bipolar spouses/family members. It was quite enthralling! I'm not a big believer in today's psycho babble or all these "syndromes" that to me are synonymous with plain old bad behaviour ESPECIALLY in spoiled children, however, it gives some interesting communication techniques.

I have come to the conclusion that men have somehow "changed" over the past 50 years or so. Men used to be stallwarth creatures with no emotions. . .the ROCK of the family. Now, granted this model has some flaws in it, today's men, I believe, through the extreme pussification movement, the drugging of boys, and, some speculate, the ESTROGEN flowing through the water supply (all those birth control chemicals have to go SOMEWHERE since 1962) have led to the "men" we have today.

I'm sure all of this has affected women too, the wild mood swings, the lack of impulse control etc. I always knew that GG was prone to wild mood swings. He even admitted it himself, so I figured I practice these communication techniques on him.

Since he's most undoubtedly still brooding over the email incident and the fact that the latest note from his daughter (SD12) has shown that there is absolutely NO parenting going on at the BM's house, I felt it would be a good time to try it!

I came home yesterday and I could see that NO plowing had been done (although we had about 6" of snow) There he was in his rocker, rocking away sipping on COFFEE (as opposed to his usual booze)

I said "hello" in a cheery fashion. He replied with a cold and staccato "HI!" but remained silent. So instead of asking him some cliche question that I don't really care about (how was your day) I remained silent, went about my business, got on the eliptical and started my workout right beside his rocker.

I let HIM take the initiative in conversation and stayed positive the whole time. I kept in mind the "S.E.T." technique and triggers in case he tried to start an argument. He didn't. Of course he hadn't been drinking so who knows if he would have done so otherwise.

He went from ice stone cold to actual laughing at the "World's Dumbest" tv show series throughout the course of the evening. I continued to make small talk, positive, upbeat whenever he would initiate conversation. Still NOTHING about VD's note of course, but I figure if he wanted to talk about it he would.

This morning, he was slightly less "colder" than last night but once again, warmed up, he finished cleaning he snow off of my car, moved it to the top of the driveway and said he would help Awesomeson son out of the driveway later.

So far so good. It's a means to an end right now. Once again, thanks Vickmeister!!