We've been married 32 years, and I got...
My father gave me one really wise piece
of advice before I got married
and it's held true for 32 years.
On my wedding day, my father said to me,
"Before you argue with your new wife"
"and you're gonna argue with her,"
"before you do, take some time, step back,"
"ask yourself two questions:"
"Do you want to be right? Or do you want to be happy?"
Right.
And then he broke down and sobbed
right in front of me.
(audience laughing)
I had no idea what that man was talking about.
32 years later I could tell you this:
I'm a happy, happy, happy man.
(audience laughing)
I ain't been right in 12 years now.
Sometimes I even have to ask her, Am I happy?
"Oh, you better believe you're happy."
I was just checking with you, Buttercup.
I call my friends up, I can't go golfing,
but I'm a happy, happy, happy man.
And don't get me wrong, we argue,
you've got to argue in your marriage.
You don't argue in your marriage,
it'll build up in your brain over time
and fries your brain.
Yeah, then you wind up like those
babbling, mumbling couples like you've seen
in Arizona, Florida... 50 plus years of marriage,
they're kind of walking down the street.
The wife is fine.
It's the poor husband eight feet behind her
that scares me to death, this poor man's
all hunched over, he's vibrating, mumbling.
"Always telling me what to do..."
"Start telling you what to do!"
"I'm a man! You can't tell... I'm a man, I'm a man!"
This poor guy's starting to try to win back
all the arguments he's been throwing away
for 50 years.
You know he was 6'3" when he got married,
now he's 4 foot 1, look at the poor man.
Weighed down by a half a century of apathy,
"Leave a toilet seat up if I"
"want to leave a toilet seat up."
"Tell me what to do."
"I hope you sit in the water every night, I don't care."
And that's when she turns around,
"What'd you just say to me?"
"I didn't say nothing to you!"
Scary!
Have to learn how to communicate,
that's the word, "communication."
You have to learn how your spouse communicates,
that takes time.
Men and women communicate differently.
It took me two years of marriage to figure out
my wife will never tell me to do anything
around our home.
If Tammy wants me to do something,
she'll ask me a question.
It's from the question
that I got to stand there
and figure out what it is she wants me to do.
(audience laughing)
Simple example, say I leave
a pair of my underwear in the middle of the
bedroom floor, which 'frosts' my wife.
That's her word when she's angry,
"That just frosts me Jeffrey."
(audience laughing)
And if I'm not frosting her,
I'm driving her up the wall,
that's another one.
That kids will come in, "Where's mom?"
She's up the wall with frostbite,
that's all I know.
You won't believe what put her there, man,
it was that pair of underwear in the middle
of the bedroom floor.
You're looking at the most powerful piece
of cotton on Planet Earth.
So, I leave my underwear in the middle of the room.
Would she come to me and say to me, "Pick those up,"?
That's three words.
"Hey, pick those up."
Three words!
Would she say them? No,
because that would be simple, direct
and right to the point
and at that moment, we would be communicating
at the highest human level.
The way God the creator intended it through language.
She looks at me, looks at my underwear,
and then asks,
"Are those yours?"
(audience laughing)
I sure hope they are
or otherwise I got a few questions of my own.
(audience laughing)
What do you want?
That's the only question a man has for his wife,
"What do you want?"
Quit talking in code and tell me what you want!
My favorite question, we weren't married two months,
I'm leaving the house, I got golf clubs
on my shoulder, got golf shoes in my hand
and everybody knows what she asks me.
"Where you going?"
I was only married a couple months,
I didn't know any better.
I looked at her, I'm going bowling, Columbo.
(audience laughing)
If you're taking notes, that would be
the wrong answer.
(audience laughing)
An hour later, I was still in my living room.
Come on tell me what is this about,
please, lemme know, please!
I can make the back nines,
just let me know!
It's about knowing the right answer.
That's why, why your beautiful, intelligent wife
would ask such a banal question.
I know better today.
If I'm leaving the house with golf clubs
on my shoulder today and Tammy says, "Where you going?"
Go put these in the car baby,
I'm gonna come back and mow our lawn.
(audience laughing)
Just practicing leaving for golf.
Hey! Did you know Dry Bar Comedy has their own app?
You can download it right now to watch, save and share clips
and you can watch my entire comedy special right on your phone
How cool is that?