Cement Teddy Bears and Cursed Orange Juice

or "How I Spent My Weekend"

Ah, Father's Day weekend! A time for family and fun - or so the greeting card industry tells us. So let's review the joys of this past weekend.

Tick Tock
The festivities started early for us - Thursday evening, to be exact - when I found a rather small tick on my leg. Not knowing anything about Lyme Disease other than it being fairly common in my area, I made the bone-headed move of trying to find information online. What little I found in regards to the disease and pregnancy said that it could be passed from mother to child and that could rarely cause miscarriage or stillbirth. Oh joy. I called my OB/GYN and his office advised that I head to the ER. So that was where I spent my evening, with the doctors and nurses looking at me like I was a lunatic for going in for a tick bite. I came home greatly relieved, though, to know that it is unlikely that I'll get it and even if I do, that the baby should be fine.

"The world is full of cement teddy bears"
Our plans for Saturday were to go to my husband's company picnic. It was a hard decision to make to go to it - the picnic is arranged by people in an office in the next state, so the picnic site is an hour and a half away. Still, the usually have good things for kids so we figured Rhi would really have fun. It was disappointing to arrive and find that there was only one other person from my husband's office there, but we pretty much expected that. The food was a bit mediocre as well, but that wasn't too big a deal. What got to us more was the way most of the people acted. I wouldn't go so far as to say they were rude... "inconsiderate" may be a better term. There was the lady with her daughter who butted in front of Rhi at the kid's face painting line. She had come up to chat with the people ahead of us in line and then when they left went ahead and sat down though we had been waiting there the entire time. Then there were the people at the picnic table. Nobody was there when we put our bag down on one end and broke out the sunscreen. A couple came and sat at the other end while we were putting on sun screen lotion. They saw other people they knew and invited them to come sit with them - forcing us away from the table completely as they left no room for us to sit and eat. There were any number of little incidents - a lady pushed me into the drinks table, people rushing to cross in front of Rhi and I, making me pull her back quickly or be run over, etc. At one point as we walked towards a pond to walk around, Rhi saw a little boy walking by and said "Hi!" he completely ignored her. I had to smile at her and commented to my husband about how she is such a friendly child. He agreed then added "But unfortunately, the world is full of cement teddy bears." We left shortly after that.

I don't think they'll let us back in there again
Sunday morning saw us bright and early at a local garden center checking out their supply of flagstones. We were amazed at the selection of different types of rock and were trying to decide just what we wanted for the patio we are putting in. Leaving there, we decided to stop at a place on the way home to get some lunch. I was pretty amazed at the size of the glass of orange juice the waiter brought for Rhi. I was worried that she'd spill the juice trying to get to the straw, and sure enough, first time she reached for the glass she spilled juice all over the front of her. OK - not the first spill we've ever dealt with - I get her cleaned up as much as possible while the hubster cleans up her chair and booster seat. We get her all settled in her seat again... and she promptly falls out, scraping her arm. We get our food and the actual eating goes well enough. Then at the end of the meal as my husband was reaching for something his arm hits the orange juice glass, knocking it all over the table. The lady at the table behind us laughed when she heard my husband say that it was cursed orange juice. I just couldn't stop laughing as we were trying to mop it all up. We wasted no time paying the check and getting out of there before it was my turn to knock over the juice.

Tick Tock Too
So we spent the rest of Sunday at home, alternately taking it easy and working on the patio. After dinner Rhi asked if we could go outside and my husband said he wanted to do more work on the patio. So he and Rhi went outside while I cleaned up some dishes and got some shoes on. Just after I get outside, my husband tells me I need to take Rhi in and clean her up - she had wandered over to the yard next door where they had to reseed the yard and had the yard covered with hay that was most likely soaked with chemicals or fertilizer and she had fallen down into it. While bathing her I noticed a little dot on her leg - sure enough it was a tiny tick. Since I'd had the ER visit a few nights ago, I knew not to panic about it, but called our doctor's office this morning. They told me to just keep an eye on her for the next 2 weeks and call them if she develops any symptoms. So not only do we get to wait and see if I get sick, now we get to wait and see for Rhi as well.

I need a vacation to recover from my weekend

I wonder if I can find good rates to Tahiti?

Dinner with Ogres

"I feel like we had dinner with ogres" my husband said as we were getting ready for bed. I had to chuckle, because I agreed. Unfortunately, the ogres we were talking about were my brother and nephews.

I love my brother dearly. He's got a good heart. But in spite of my memories to the contrary, I really cannot believe he and I were raised in the same house. I'm not exactly a formal person. I don't generally stand on ceremony. But my dear brother has the social graces of a musk ox.

And so after spending the afternoon in the kitchen to make a meal and hauling it all outside to the patio furniture, we were rewarded with endless talk about the various emissions my one nephew kept producing at a restaurant the night before. This was followed by crude jokes about Star Wars characters. There was a little bit of variety to the conversation - comments from the kids about not liking the food and frequent reminders for the 6 year old to wipe his nose.

As my former Marine husband noted, they could get quite crude in the service - when it was just them. But they at least employed tact when in mixed company or around kids. In 40 years, my brother still hasn't learned that.

And he's an example to a new generation of ogrelings.

And people wonder why I want to move to another state sometimes.