There are certain unspoken rules between men and women that if we all just stuck to them, everything would be fine.

You know – the normal stuff.

Put the toilet seat down, don’t leave hair and girly stuff all over the sink agree to disagree that Sex and the City is a life manual and that sitting in front of a TV pressing buttons and looking at sport is almost the same thing as playing it.

But the big one?

Never, ever call your wife fat.

Don’t ever refer to her as “big”, “thunder thighs” or “guzzle-guts”.

Her bum is never too big for that dress.

No, that girl is not skinnier than her and yes, she is beautiful.

Do you hear that Alex?

NEVER even hint at calling your slightly neurotic, short burning fuse, takes most things literally wife ‘big’.

I have to write it down, because we are not talking at the moment.

Well I’m not talking and he is not so much talking as groveling for forgiveness.

And so he should.

The moment of our communication brake down came at 8.28pm Sunday evening.

I had just received a lovely package in the mail – seriously I love Ebay – it’s like Christmas every week – and pulled out a fabulous Stella McCartney dress.

As with most Stella dresses, she is very pretty, flowing and designed to be a little more billowing in that style that women seem to love and men can’t stand.

Anyways, I squeezed her on, admired her flowingness in the mirror and flounced down stairs to show off my latest (and bargain!) purchase.

Where I was greeted with this.

“Oh, is that your new dress?

“It kinda shows off how big you are. You look huge.”

I’m not sure if it was the rush of blood to the head which gave away the fact Alex was sauntering into dangerous territory or the scrunching of the fists.

In as calm a voice as I could manage (under the circumstances – there may have been some squawking) I asked him to repeat what he had just said.

He began to backtrack, but the damage had already been done.

You think he would have learned from the first time when he called me thunder thighs “as a joke!” about a year ago.

He didn’t see those “thunder thighs” for about a month after that – lest I crushed him during an intimate moment accidentally.

And it may be a while before he gets to see my “big” body adorned in anything other than a mumu.

So guys, let that be a lesson for you all.

If you want to get it out of your pants every now and then, keep those sorts of thoughts in your head.

This has been a public service announcement for cranky women anonymous.