Yesterday turned out to be one of those days where we look around at the end of it and say, "... and let us never speak of it again." Nothing horrible, really, just not a good day in terms of patience and kindness to your fellow family members. It turns out that sometimes absence DOES make the heart grow fonder, especially if you're talking about escaping a small box by taking a walk for a while. So. Accordingly, then, rather than regaling you with more tales of our exploits, I thought there's been so much general interest in camping that I might help some of the on-the-fence amongst you...
The reason we got a camper is because my idea of "roughing it" is raising children. And having a place to plug in my crock pot. Details. Our camper is neither large nor fancy, but it did allow us to have veggie chili for dinner last night (seriously, a crock pot while camping is AWESOME) while sitting in our little air-conditioned box. And that is awesome because it is currently 95 degrees and a billion percent humidity every day here at Myrtle Beach. [Digression: If I had a nickel for every time I found myself turning to Otto and saying, "Have you MET these children?", I could retire....
Tomorrow we leave on our last camping trip of the summer, and I want you to know that because I am a paragon of planning and efficiency, I have not done one single thing to prepare. NOT ONE. I mean, I wanted to. I PLANNED to. And yet... yeah. Nothing. Remember back when I was all "Oh, this summer is going to be so relaxing! I can't wait!"? While I am not actually admitting to smoking crack, let's just say I'm not sure I was entirely WITH myself when I said that. I simply don't DO relaxing, because it takes a lot of energy to consistently be this disorganized. Take yesterday, for example. We...
We try very hard to do a few special things with each kid when we have just one of them, so last night we took Monkey out for dinner to his favorite restaurant. What he likes best about it is that the nachos are not so much tortilla chips covered in cheese as they are a plate of cheese with a tortilla garnish. What Otto and I like best about it is that the margaritas are very cheap. So. Somehow we got sucked into one of those circuitous conversations where Literal Boy's brain has a small short-circuit; I had said something about pants that accentuated my hips (no, I don't know why were...
I meant to do another (final) installment of Otto Week, over the weekend, but I turned out to be too busy with my favorite boy-type people to get around to it. See, on Saturday Monkey came back, and on Sunday, Otto returned. Of course, Chickadee left on Saturday, so I still don't have the entire family here, but that's okay for right now. Digression, except not really, because this is probably going to be kind of long: Are all 12-year-old girls sociopaths, or just mine? I'm asking for real. Because she's positively charming and I cannot get enough of her and everything is super awesome right...
Pardon the brief interruption. We now return you to our regularly-scheduled Otto Week. Sometimes I wonder if I do poke at Otto just a little too much. I mean, I love him to pieces, and I'm pretty sure he knows that, but I'm also just kind of a jerk, sometimes. And that's aside from the fact that I suspect it's hard to be married to someone who regularly tells the Internet "Hey, this totally embarrassing thing happened! Let me describe it to you in EXCRUCIATING DETAIL!" Other times, I figure it's just part of that whole we-are-totally-meant-to-be-together thing that he puts up with and maybe...
1) Whoever is "It" is not allowed to wear goggles. 2) Game may be delayed for prolonged argument between children as to whether wearing goggles on your FOREHEAD qualifies as "wearing goggles." 3) Everyone has to play or someone is going to whine. LOUDLY. 4) When playing with the "no getting out of the pool" rule, you may still get out of the pool as long as you immediately execute a spectacular cannonball to establish your whereabouts. 5) Rule number 4 is actually imaginary. Expect copious complaining from "It" after executed. 6) The dog is not required to respond "Polo!" at any time. 7)...
The children are away with their dad, and the first few years here in the south we used their vacation to do Big Projects here in the house. Now that we've run out of patience and money (ha!), summer holds no such drudgery over our heads, and while it's awfully nice to have a little time off, I just plain miss them. Because, yeah, it's nice to be able to sleep naked or whatever, but not as nice as having everyone home. And the progression is the same, every time they're gone for two weeks: The first week is AWESOME! Woooo! Let's eat dinner on the couch! Let's go to the movies and see...
I keep a running list of random things in my brain that I mean to blog about "sometime" for whatever reason. On the one hand, I'd probably remember more of them (and actually get around to writing about them) if I wrote them down. On the other hand, I kind of figure I'm a big enough dork that if I don't write them down, it saves me from an even deeper level of geekdom. (On the third hand---who has a third hand?---think of all the wondrous world problems I may have had the brain power to solve, were it not for random blog topics, all the words to every song on Beauty and the Beat, and all of...
