Top TEN-sion List

From our home office in Wisconsin Rapids, the 10 holiday tasks that you should not do with your spouse if you want to have a Merry Christmas:

10) Untangling Christmas lights. One will inevitably say, "I can do this. Just give me a few minutes," while the other says, "Screw it. I'm going to town to buy new ones."

9) Hanging lights or decorations outside. "That's not even! A little to the left... no. A little more. That's it. Nope. Go to the right..."

8) Shopping. "Let's just see what we find." No. You must go armed with a specific list. This is not the time of year to fight crowds of other unfocused shoppers and expect not to snap at each other.

7) Picking out a Christmas card or composing the all-important annual letter (even tougher when both spouses are writers/editors for a living). One of you just take responsibility and do it! (But let the other one proof it.)

6) Shoveling or snowblowing. Actually, to avoid chronic back pain and bouts of pouts, you should work out a system to take turns (unless there's a doctor's excuse). Otherwise one of you will get grinchy.

5) Replacing a dryer belt. OK. I'm busted. This wasn't really going to be a list about Christmas tasks. I just can't get over how much bickering goes into a team effort of doing a home improvement/home repair project. (It probably sounded like the dad in the Christmas Story movie when he's futzing with the furnace!)

Let's see, it probably doesn't help that neither one of us really knew what we were doing. Although we acted like it because we had diagrams printed off the Internet. Oh well, we survived. We got it fixed and we have our first load of dry clothes to prove it.

May you and your significant other have an enjoyable holiday season. And don't forget to always end each day with a kiss -- whether there's a mistletoe nearby or not!