Dear Diver,

My wife is obsessed with how clean the house is when people come over, as if they’re going so see how we really live and shun us from society. I think she’s needlessly stressing and that most people in Durango are slobs due to having active lifestyles, dogs, too much gear, etc. In fact, I would wager to say a clean house is a sign of an empty life. She’s not buying it though. Help! Her need to clean is cutting into my fun time.

– Mr. Clean

Dear MC,

Well, on the other hand, your wife could be a super slob whose car smells like rotten banana and whose body smells worse. Be thankful you’re dealing with this extreme. All you have to do is clean smarter and faster. Try these tricks, poached from my awesome, OCD, clean-freak auntie in Miami: When you’re wiping down countertops in the kitchen, put rags under your feet too and shuffle around to get the floor, too. Put washable placemats under absolutely everything. Spray some shower cleaner in the shower before you get in, then go to work. And remember when you’re standing there with your loofah in one hand and a sponge in the other, “Happy wife, happy life.”

Be a big boy, and clean up your toys!

– Pants

Dear Diver,

My friends and I were hypothesizing the other day about what happened to the missing Malaysian airliner. They all are buying into the common theory that is was a terrorist plot or equipment malfunction, but I think there’s something no one is talking about: alien abduction. Think about it: flying at altitude, gone without a trace, no radar. It’s obvious it was beamed to another planet or galaxy for who knows what. Why can’t anyone else see this? Or is it just a massive cover up?

– The Truth is Out There

Dude,

I’m not touching that one with a 10-foot pole. People died in that plane accident. This is a humorous advice column and while I have been known to have some bad foot-in-mouth syndrome, even I know when we’re outta bounds. If you want to talk with people who will take your theory seriously, go to New Mexico. I hear there are some people who “Choose to Believe” down there.

– Yours, Scully

Dear Diver,

So, this bitchy girl I knew from high school recently got in touch with me via facebook. Seems she has a friend who just moved here and she wants to put us in touch. Needless to say, I am a bit leery. I mean, do I really want to be friends with someone who’s friends with someone who would never give me the time of day except to order me to move at the lunch table or laugh at me at the bus stop as she drove by in her Rabbit convertible?

– Still Bitter

Dear Bitter,

If she just wants to introduce you to someone who is new to town, I’d let her do it. Who knows, maybe her “friend” secretly hates her too and you both can bond over a mutual disdain for someone who sounds like they spent high school acting like a shabby impersonation of the spoiled rich brat from all those 1980s John Hughes movies? Besides, a Rabbit convertible? Blech. If she’d driven a Mustang, then yes, she would have had every right to laugh at everyone in her high school, because that would’ve been totally “rad.” Here’s to being neo maxi zoom dweebies!

– Miss Pants-who-wishes-shoulder-pads- were-still-in-style   

In a sticky situation?