White Lightning Axiom: Redux

Ahhh, the weekend is upon us once again. The birds are singing, the sun is casting its warmth down upon us, flowers are blooming - there is peace in the Haupertonian Empire. I struck out onto the turnpike a bit earlier this time so I could get back before the sun went down. The Mrs and I had decided that it would be nice if the kids could enjoy our snow before it all melted away. In one day, it has nearly all vaporized. I go directly to the Child ReEducation Interment Center (and day care) to snatch them up as early as possible. They were in various stages of unpreparedness, of course. After assembling all the shoes, socks and assorted clothing items, we dash off to the Manor so we can get an hour or two of sledding in before the sun sets. Get home, disarm the robo sentries with anti-personnel flechette rounds, let the Hounds out to rip up the back yard and make yellow snow. I quickly ensconce the kids in their nuclear winter combat armor and we go out to make the best of a melting situation. They happily seat themselves in the two sleds that the Grandparents bough for them and tell me to MUSH. Over the next 90 minutes, I pull them across the 3 properties until every inch of snow has been flattened or eaten. Yeah, the kids love to eat snow. As much as possible, the dirtier the better. Yetch. I just have to make sure to keep them away from the yellow stuff. Speaking of yellow stuff. We had a problem with Thor. The Mrs let him out in the morning and he did not relieve himself. He did not do it the evening before either. After a day plus of holding it in, he could not do so anymore and left a mountain of crap in his kennel The odor hit me like a sledge when I got to that part of the Manor. Once the Mrs arrived home, I turned the kids over to her and set forth to deal with the toxic material spill. It was horrendous! I'm not sure how he managed to escape getting none of it on him. It must have been a friggen miracle or holy act of God. There must have been a gallon of the stuff ... and it had remained sufficiently 'juicy' so that completely soaked into his blanket. I had to dismantle the kennel (under strict supervision from the AIEA, those bozos) so that I could drag it outside and spray it down. The EPA will probably set up the back 50 as a superfund site now.

The rest of the evening was fairly placid. Jake tried to sneak out of his room once. I caught him at the door and he ran back to his bed when he saw me. My daddy-senses were tingling when I heard the little thump of him jumping off the futon. I just waited there at the door as he jiggled the knob to spring the latch. He had a huge smile on his little face that always makes him look so innocent and cute. He knew he was busted and that the jig was up. All he really wanted was a different book to look at till he fell asleep. He loves the Disney Character books that the Grandparents bought. I spend the remainder of the evening in the Master Suite, watching the Sci-Fi channel and waiting for a second escape attempt by the little ones. Keep on my toes, I must. Three hours later and no repeat performances from the wandering ones. Time for the 'Big People Who Feed' to get a few hours of shut-eye.

It's a good start for a Saturday. The kids sleep in till 0730. The Mrs and I take advantage of this. Yeah, we sleep in too. When we eventually mustered the strength to extract ourselves from the tangled web of sleep's tentacles, we immediately started to get ready for the day. She hit the shower while I extracted the kids from their interment cubes. Alexis was fully awake and sprung into my arms but Jake was still asleep. His head was resting on the futon while the rest of his body was still on his mattress. He is going to need a fairly large bed when he gets older. I open the shades and make a bit of racket to try to wake him slowly. There is no perceivable impact at all. I start to slowly rub his back. This sensory input seems to break through and he begins to stir, stretch and roll over ... and go back to sleep. You have chosen wisely, little man.

We load up the Family Tank and leave the Manor. It is a few minutes after 0900, a new record for Saturday departures. We want to get to IHOP as early as possible to avoid the wait we were forced to endure last weekend. We failed. It seems that the IHOP we are going to is in a perpetual state of being mobbed. Ahh, and by the literally unwashed masses this early in the morning to boot. We wait in the Tank for a good 10-15 minutes before making our assault on the front desk. The Mrs had gone in and put our name down. Rule #1, if you are going to wait it out, make sure to get your reservation in ASAP. No sooner did the Mrs complete her pinpoint precision strike, a wave of multi-member families unloaded from the stowage class minivans and bogged down the front desk. We strode in and were seated within a minute of our appearance. I could feel the eyes cast upon us, following our fluid movement through the Ellis Island Lines of interment. The envy was palpable. The meal went well. No flying condiments or cross outbursts of dissatisfaction. The kids behaved well too! Pancakes, sausage, toast, pancakes, hot chocolate, eggs, and more pancakes. After we settle the massive bill (15$) and trek out of the magnificently over-stuffed restaurant, we head off to the local mall. The Willow Grove mall is a special sort of place. It is special only in it's history. Other than that, it is a mundane representation of consumerism repeated a thousand times over in a thousand separate cities. The Mrs wanted to pick up some things and the believed this would be the best place to do so. Malls are like anti-matter to most men. I gritted my teeth, girded my loins and dove into the fray. There was a battalion of stroller-pushing mommies. A phalanx of senior mall-walkers making their rounds (kept note of where the defibrillator was). Disengaged flocks of doe eyed teenagers migrating between the various clothing stores and the food court. Not an environment that I flourish in. It's akin to planting an orchid in the steppes of Asia. Not good. Somehow, we end up in the Disney store. The kids were keen on making sure that I understood the gravity of the situation that we found ourselves in. They proclaimed eminent domain over the stuffed dolls and insisted that they have the God given right to inspect every single one before deciding on which one shall be offered in tribute for the prevention of wailing in a public place. Bribery bad? Yes. Did I care, no. Alexis got Jessie from Toy Story 2 and Jake got Buz Lightyear. They were more than happy to surrender the characters to the cashier for him to ring them up, but they kept their laser sights focused on his name tag. He was well versed in this manner of negotiations and swiftly returned the hostage products. Disney got their money, the kids got their toys, the parents got their sanity ... all without any bloodshed or missing digits. Life is good, time to go home and tuck the little ones in for a nap.

I was fortunate enough to have the Mrs allow me to head out for a night with my fellow members of the local YCOP. The dinner was to be at 1700, but I ended up getting to the restaurant thirty minutes late. It was the Bertuccis in Bryn Mawr just south of Villanova. I miscalculated and got off at the 76 exit on the blue route. That added a bit of time to my trip. The group was fairly large, I think every Republican in SE Pennsyltucky was there. All 25 of us. I was able to talk freely with several people and was relieved to hear that my non-conformist views were not immediately struck down with slurs and personal assaults on my integrity. It made me so relaxed, I ended up buying a martini and forgetting that I had given up alcohol for Lent. DOH! Later on, the group broke up and some of us ended up down the street at the local Great American Pub. It was myself, Alex, John Morley and Steve (I think, the evening is foggy at best) sitting at the bar while John spun fabulous tales between vociferously hitting on the bar tender. The Bartender, Michele, did her best to gracefully decline the invitations to NYC after revealing her primary career as a performance artist. More about the evening can be found here at Alex's blog, he was much more lucent at the time. The marine (CPL Philips) we met was indeed a true hero. When his car ended up being towed, I had did not have to think twice about giving him a lift to retrieve it from the impound lot. The lot was somewhere along CityLine Ave along the backside of the Schuylkill expressway. It was a 160$ toll that will most likely be refunded, the tow truck operator was in no position to be generous and felt as bad as anyone could. Philips made his way home down to Drexel Hill while I scouted a return path through the wilds of NE Philly. Something along the lines of Rt1 past Einstein Trauma to 611 to 309 to the PA Tpk and then on to my standard route. Driving in the NE can be a pain, the darkness of a winter's night where everything is the same shade of pale grey can make it that much more disconcerting. I arrive at the manor sometime after midnight and relay the evenings events to the Mrs who either found them as interesting as I did, or was unusually amused by the vigor in which I described the proceedings. All in all, a well used day.

# posted by mdmhvonpa @ 12:47 PM