Q: Smug Marrieds, we’re newlyweds who have started to ditch all the single friends we promised ourselves we never would, the reason being we just don’t have much in common anymore. Is this par for the course?
Bret says…
When you say you don’t have much in common, what you really mean is that your single friends are still into going out at night, where they bowl and drink and talk about politics and culture and the DHARMA Initiative, but you’ve lost the taste for all that and instead you want everyone to come over to your house for a Grown-up Dinner Party, where they will admire your nice china and your chocolate fountain and talk about the price of real estate. You want your old friends to think it’s cool that you and your new spouse find each other so satisfying that most evenings all you want to do is sit together in front of a rerun of Trading Spaces. You want your friends to have opinions about reruns of Trading Spaces. You are out of your fucking mind. Here is who finds your newlywed life excellent: you and your new spouse. Here is who wants to join in: nobody.
Do you like friends? Then find a way to talk to your single friends about stuff you used to find interesting. Also, unplug your chocolate fountain and sell it on Craigslist.
Kate says…
Scary but true: You just might not be married forever. Then what?

Q: Smug Marrieds, I used to drive all the time, but now my hubby is always in the driver’s seat and I’m the passenger. What’s up with that?
Kate says…
Maybe you can explain this phenomenon to me. I have never understood it, and I’ve seen it happen again and again. Not always, but really, really often, women just let their husbands drive all the time when they are in the car together. It’s not that they’ve forgotten how to drive—they still manage to get around quite handily when they are alone.
Drinking helps, I find. If he always drives, then surely he must always drive when you’ve been out to a dinner party, which means you get to drink all the wine. Typically, unless he is truly freakishly uptight about this, he realizes the sacrifice he’s making and you naturally end up negotiating equal driving rights.
But then, not everyone drinks, so the question remains: Is it just that once comfortably coupled, men feel that they can let their naturally controlling instincts prevail behind the wheel? Or is it that they believe that they are better drivers than their partners? Or do they feel emasculated by the idea of merely sitting in the passenger seat?
With Bret and me, I drive maybe 80 percent of the time, which, from what I can tell, suits us both. Or perhaps that only proves that I am controlling, superior and somehow frightened of having my penis chopped off.
Bret says…
Darling, do you even need me to write this column?

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