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If It Isn't One Thing, It's Another


by Jack Swenson


My friend says there's some kind of bug that bites its mate's head off after they have sex.  I ask him which one gets decapitated, the male or the female.  The male, he says.

I tell him that figures.  He nods.  I ask him how he is getting along with his Mrs.  About the same, he says.

I go back home and tell my wife about the bugs.  That's awful, she says.  That night in bed we nest like spoons.  I ask her if she's going to bite my head off afterward.  She giggles.

Time passes.  My wife has the night sweats.  When she's comfy, I'm freezing to death.  We sleep in separate bedrooms.  I get tinnitus in my ears.  I have nightmares.  One night I dream that somebody is trying to kill me, and I fall out of bed.

My wife goes to the dentist and pays a thousand dollars to have her teeth whitened.  I go back to the shrink I had when I was having anxiety attacks and try to find out what the hell is wrong with me this time.

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