Shopping husbands' club doomed to fail

FREDERICK FRANKLY: This was one errand on which I found myself revolting. “You are coming shopping with me,” my wife insisted.

Fred Archer Photo: Scottie Simmonds/NewsMail. Picture: Scottie Simmonds

AS I'M sure readers will know, it is rare indeed for me to disobey a direct order from my wife.

But this was one errand on which I found myself revolting. To show how serious my displeasure was, I pouted and kicked at the dirt with my best shoes.

"You are coming shopping with me," my wife insisted.

"Stop acting like a child and I will buy you an ice cream."

She had me right there. I found myself trailing her through the shopping centre, whingeing and whining all the way.

"We have been walking around for hours," I blubbered.

"And you have bought nothing. What are you doing?"

My wife pretended not to own me, but hissed out of the corner of her mouth: "We are shopping."

"But what for?" I asked.

"I will know what for when I see it," she replied.

She decided it was time to try to soothe me lest I throw a real tantrum.

"Sit on that bench and I will get you an ice cream," she said.

Already sitting there was another mature man - older than me, as they all are. He also had an ice cream.

"Wife shopping?" I asked him.

Of course that was the case. Naturally, we got to talking about the joys of marriage.

Almost immediately we both had the same idea. We should form a club for husbands forced to accompany their wives shopping.

We put the word out and soon had enough potential members to easily fill the Civic Centre.

The first meeting was in the afternoon and the club should have been off to a runaway success. Somehow, someone moved that the next meeting should be at night and, of course, it killed the club stone dead.

Some time later, I found myself sitting on the same mall bench with the same old man, each of us licking at our ice creams.

"Did you get to the second meeting?" he asked.

"How could I?" I replied. "So few manage to get out at night it had to fail.

"I mean, what husband is allowed out of the house after dark?"

"Well, the idea was good," he said "Almost as good as this ice cream."

"Yes," I had to agree.

"Shopping with the wife does have its small rewards."
 

Originally published as Shopping husbands' club doomed to fail