Thursday, February 22, 2007

The other day Hank and I had a discussion about stubbornness. Unsurprisingly it turned into a debate about who was more stubborn. I did my best to persuade Hank that although people sometimes call me stubborn, they're really just confusing curmudgeonry with stubbornness. Although I'll complain about horrible things like camping or skiing, ultimately we do these things and I try to make the best of it.

We needed a third party to resolve this dispute. Naturally we turned to Daisy.
As it turned out, someone who can't even define the word stubborn probably isn't the right person to judge a stubbornness contest. We continued the search.

"Let's ask Liz! She's known us both for years." Hank offered.

"No way! Liz is my ex-girlfriend and one that dumped me on top of that. Of course she'd say I was the most stubborn! I think that was even a condition of the break-up."

"How about Larry?"

"Nuh uh. He's married to Liz. For years now, she's been telling him how stubborn I am. They're married and uni-brain now."

After much contemplation, the perfect answer presented itself at the wedding this weekend. Pablo! He's been our friend for years and had the bonus of having worked with each of us as well. Hank and I both agreed that he was a qualified and neutral judge. He sat across from us at the reception and we explained what we needed from him.

"So, there it is, Pablo. You're the decider. Which of us is more stubborn?"

Pablo chewed on this for a few moments.

"This is hard. So, I'll just have to use what evidence I have. I know that Mike has been fighting against your upcoming remodel, but you guys are still going to do it, so I guess that means you're more stubborn, Hank."

I hoo-hoo'ed and generally celebrated, while Hank digested this development.

"Well," she defended, "Does it really count as stubbornness if I'm just right all the time?"

Nice try, Hank!

6 comments:

Siôn said...

Surely the best way to prove that your the least stubborn is to admit that your the more stubborn. Thus then proving that the other party is the more stubborn by not admitting so. No?

Mike said...

Siôn, you know, the irony of having an unending argument about who is more stubborn never occurred to me. Consequently, the obvious solution never did either.

You win.

Anonymous said...

Mike, you glossed over Daisy's part in all this rather thoroughly...

Mike said...

Chess, and that's why I'm not an A-List blogger.

You know, when I was writing this up, I couldn't really remember what Daisy had said, just that she ended up being a really crappy judge.

mox said...

I can't believe you had to have a judge for this contest... the woman always is the more stubborn one. It's like a rule of nature or something.

Me, I'm definately the more stubborn one in my marriage. And considering how stubborn my husband is, that's saying a lot.

I am also always right.

Maybe it's a woman thing.

Mike said...

Mox, yeah, but in San Francisco it's possible that the rules of nature are reversed. Kind of like how water swirls the opposite direction in the southern hemisphere.