This morning I got when the alarm went off (!!), suited out for “gym,” and headed out for an early morning walk. I didn’t intend to take anyone along with me, but Macey busted me as I was heading out. Evidently the standby Old Navy track suit walking gear gave me away. She sat and whined at me as I put on my shoes, so I invited her along. She’s easy to walk with, and she never gets to go, so she was happy too.
It was fantastic. The sun was shining and, while I was trying to get a little exercise in, I decided I wasn’t going to go nuts and I’d just try to enjoy the time by myself. So I just listened to Norah Jones and strolled along trying not to think about all of the stuff I wanted to get accomplished. As I was walking, I realized that it’s the first walk I’ve taken by myself in the six months we’ve been here…and certainly the earliest I’ve ever left the house. It starts getting light at six and although I was tired the rest of the day (what’s new?), it felt great to know that I’d DONE something as I ate Black Forrest Cake this evening.
Anyway, the morning plan was that we would either go to the park or head to Home Base (think Home Depot/Lowe’s). At about 9ish, we ditched the park idea and I decided to head to the store. I got Elena all ready to go in her JoCo track suit and tried to get L to finish eating breakfast and get dressed so we could leave. After 45 minutes of prodding him, I finally just decided to take Elena to the car and tell him I was leaving. I had to run back in the house for my phone and he was still sitting at the table playing with his cars. I yelled “bye” and as I walked to the car I heard him running to the door yelling, “DON’T LEAVE ME, MAMAAAAAA!” as though I’d never mentioned the fact that we were going somewhere. He’s such a drama queen.
I went back to the door and he was rushing to get his shoes on (the wrong feet) and throwing on his big winter coat (completely unnecessary, but I was tired of fighting him). When he was dressed, he quit crying, grabbed my hand and as we walked out the door together, he asked if we were going to the park. I told him “yes, to the place where the cars go to play” (the parking lot is known as a car park here) and he headed out happily as though nothing ever happened.
The store isn’t that far away, but the drive ended up being a little longer than I expected. (Maybe because I was avoiding a round-a-bout and maybe not.) By the time we arrived, Elena had yakked all over her coat and hoodie and was totally stinking up the car. In fact, the car smelled so bad that I had pushed the recirculate button on the vent thinking that it was something from outside, only to recirculate the nasty air from inside the car. Yummy.
I pulled her out of her nasty clothes and tried to get L to give her his coat since she only wearing a onesie and pants. I never expected the fit he threw. He made quite a scene for the patrons and the guys who were hand washing cars in the parking lot. I finally had to pry the coat off of him and let him cry the whole way up to the store. He swore he was cold, even though he was wearing two long sleeve shirts, so I offered him my coat. It was my nicer-could-pass-as-dressy coat and I had to roll up the sleeves and roll up the coat itself and cinch the belt to keep it all from dragging on the floor.
Before I rolled up the sleeves, he looked like Brobee, the green striped guy with really long arms from Yo Gabba Gabba! Then he totally looked like Harry Potter.
Home Base was your typical home store, and I had my typical problems trying to find what I needed. I finally asked for help after trekking through the store a few times, only to find that I had walked down the aisle twice and completely missed the items I was looking for. Totally typical. I will say though, at least this time they were discretely sitting on the top shelf, instead of next to the huge sign that said, “HEIDI. HERE ARE THE NAILS YOU NEED - RIGHT HERE.” And in my defense, the dude had problems locating them as well. Besides, I was focused on keeping L from putting non-needed items into the trolley.
We also got some fencing to cordon off a spot for the dogs in the backyard so that I don’t have to spend hours walking horizontal zig-zags trying to pick up all of their crap so that the kids can spend seven minutes outside before they decide it’s not all that exciting. I was trying to find some stakes and Liam was messing around with everything so I was trying to hurry. I found some that were going to be ridiculously large and over priced but as we went to pay, I saw some bamboo.
Bingo.
It was exactly what we needed. We put the other stuff back and grabbed it. Liam could. not. keep his hands off of it. So, here’s L, in my black coat tied at the waist, collar pulled up around his face, waving a bamboo pole around HomeBase.
He was so Harry Potter and he didn’t even know it.
We paid for our goods - and about five other things L snuck into the trolley - and headed home. The trip was pleasantly mindless, as I didn’t have to avoid a round-a-bout, and I spent part of the afternoon assembling the dog fence. It was SO simple. I don’t know why I didn’t do it before now.
Wait. I DO know why…it involved driving the car somewhere.
Woo HOO! Look at me all drivin’ in the car n’ shit to get the job done. Mmm hmm, that’s right. Mama rocks the left side of the road.
Unfortunately Mama didn’t rock letting Murphy know that there was a fence in the yard.
(Note brown plant that Murphy will no longer be able to pee on.)
(Note small, squarish area where pooping is allowed. Also note rake which does not work to scoot poo into a pile. Finally, note wheelbarrow now tucked safely behind the poop/pee line.)
Poor guy sauntered out the back door and ran right into it before I could say anything. Now I have a note on the door: Remind Murphy Fence, and he seems to have figured it out on his own. Or maybe he reads the note each time.
Anyway, Liam didn’t nap, which is always a joy, so I got him in bed at 6 and dressed to go out to dinner with A. By the time A got home around 6.30, E was ready for bed, so he did that and we were ready to go, with a mostly silent house when Jenn got here at 10 after 7.
(We have an agreement that we’ll watch each other’s kids once a month or so on a weeknight so that the other couple can go out and not feel guilty coming home drunk to relieve the very strict Mormon babysitter - who we ADORE, by the way.)
We headed up to the Bull and Bush for some eats. We thought we’d take the bus since it was a straight shot, but the schedule was all jacked up thanks to construction and our bus wasn’t even on the schedule. We figured the board was lying, but jumped on a bus just to get to the station and figured we’d hoof it from there.
Hoofing it from there would have been ok if we hadn’t gone down the wrong street for about 10 minutes and had to retrace our steps and THEN walk up the hill to the pub. However, that wasn’t the case. Had I known that was to be the case, I certainly would not have worn cute-but-not-good-for-walking shoes. I am usually the fast walker and A asks me to slow down. This night he had his commuter walk going and I had my high heels walk going. It was not a good evening for the balls of my feet.
- Food: OK. Definitely not the best pub food I’ve had.
- Atmosphere: Interesting. We think the thing on the wall next to me might have been an old shutter from the building in 1791.
- Service: Great once we got a table since they lost our reservation.
- Company: Stellar
- Conversation: Hilarious. Somehow we got on the topic of the Mooncup. It was funny to listen to Aaron talk about the logistics of how it works, but it was even funnier to hear him say “tampon.” He totally said it like a 14-year old in a whispered voice as we were enjoying dessert: tam-PAAAHHHHN-uh. I do love that man.
We did manage to catch the bus home…and it was a straight shot.
Jenn was home safely and I was in bed by 10. Couldn’t ask for a better evening.
