happily ever after. or not. whatever.

sometimes, when my husband has just dozed off for the night, i'll poke him and put my ethereal face of love right in his and ask, "you love me, right? you're so glad you married me, right? you'd marry me again in a heartbeat, right?"

i know what you're thinking. you're thinking "geez, this chick's super insecure. someone should tell her to get a freakin' grip!"

ok, maybe you were actually thinking "yippee! i see this heading in the direction of more girly boner talk!" to which i think if you say "yippee" about anything, i totally want to hang out with you. moreso if you clap your hands like a gleeful child at the same time. we'd totally be bff.

but back to the point. i ask my husband these things not out of insecurity or silliness. well, ok, it's silliness. the man has just drifted off to sleep and i get a kick out of disturbing him. bless him that in all the time we've been together, he's always smiled and responded in the affirmitive (and sometimes gotten some girly boner action as a result).

but he's never asked me if i'd do it all over again - something i chalk up to the fact that he's not much of a talker. a journalistic nightmare, if you will. that or he's simply secure in the idea that without having to ask, he knows i would (minus the insanely awful rendition of "have i told you lately" that my friend sang at our ceremony). however, according to a new poll just released by woman's day magazine and aol, it appears i'm in the minority.

a survey of more than 3,000 married american women showed more than half wouldn't marry their current husbands again if given the opportunity. thirty six percent said "oh, hell no!" (sort of. i like to editorialize) and another twenty percent were apparently distracted and said they didn't know what they'd do. i don't know what i'm going to do for supper tonight or if i have enough money to pay the cable bill. the question of choosing the person i have wouldn't cause me to pause and ask for other options.

in addition to marriage issues, the survey, also questioned women about their stance on cheating and jealousy, flirting, marriage habits, and the all important matters of pop culture (which celeb do you think jennifer aniston should date next? you know. worldy matters. us girls gotta use these brains for something).

the survey goes on to show that 84 percent of married women would want someone to tell them if their husbands were cheating on them, and almost half of them suspect their husband of cheating or have caught them at it. however, more than 70 percent of these same women are keeping some kind of secret from their spouses. it's possible that these same women comprise the nearly 80 percent who fantasize about a man other than their husband (sure, i'll raise my hand here. hello? mike rowe? bono? anyone?). i've not necessarily kept my fondness for these purely unattainable men a secret from my husband, but there are things i'm sure i have. he's probably done the same to me. unfortunately, i have no testosterone-filled survey to let me know how men approach these issues.

i wish i did, though, because i'm curious to know their flirting habits. according to the woman's day/aol survey, 39 percent of women say they are "flirting constantly" with other men.

flirting constantly? ok. i'm a bit of a flirt. sometimes i'm a raging flirt. i flirt with the guys i work with, including the gay ones (obviously that's harmless). the kid working at starbucks in hopes he'll maybe drizzle a little bit of chocolate syrup on my whipped cream when i order a mocha frappachino (heh...that's not a double entendre, though it could be taken as such, and if you did take it like that, then i'm totally flirting with you now as i type this). i flirt with my male friends and perfect strangers. hell, i flirt with women. in my opinion, there's nothing wrong with harmless flirting. it happens in so many avenues of life, and i imagine it's safe to say purely innocent crushes abound. but the idea of "flirting constantly" wears me out just to think about it.

most importantly, i flirt with my husband. like silly high school kids. i'm constantly poking at him, sending him silly notes ("do you like me? check 'yes' or 'no'") and making up some silly name for him so he knows i dig him. he seems to like it (though maybe not that latest nickname...).

he also seems to like the fact that i'm among the 33 percent of women who more often than not opt to go to bed wearing nothing (for pure educational purposes, let me just say that i sleep so freakin' much better sans clothing. sex? sure. easy access. but not to be twisted up in the tshirt and shorts at 3 a.m. when i'm rolling over to spoon up on him is critical - because i'm not in the 30+ percentile who sleeps on the opposite end of the bed from their husband.

so now that i've educated you on women (oh yes, we think jennifer aniston should hook up with matthew "shirts are for sissies" mcconaughey next), i'm off to doff my clothes and spoon with that guy who lives here because i'm flirting with him so damn much.

what? you're upset because i didn't talk more about that whole 'girly boner' thing? heh. read between the lines. it's there.

(yeah, i just flirted with you again...)