Our Second Day up North

Ok, there are a few parts of the rest of the weekend's story that are going to sound like a serious blow to the fun-meter, and yeah, they may not have been a blast themselves, but they really didn't ruin the integrity of the weekend.

Eh, you'll see.

Lump woke up super early in the morning and, eager to see us sharing a room with her, took full advantage by refusing to fall back asleep. So our day started early.

Then a few hours later I was holding her when she passed gas. Only, it wasn't gas and she quickly boiled over like a science project volcano turned upside down. In short, she shat completely through her diaper, outfit, all over my shorts and leg, and on a nearby backpack.

Apparently well-water didn't agree with her, so for the rest of the weekend she was on milk only, and her tummy settled right down.

Meanwhile I was feeling very fatigued and had shortness of breath. It had started the night before, just after the swim, and internally I was very busy trying to figure it out. Was it a series of small but vicious panic attacks? Was it the long-awaited heart attack? All I knew was that I felt like sh**.

And then it dawned on me. Mosquitoes. I'm allergic to mosquitoes.

Oh, I know nowadays everyone's allergic to something. It's hip and funky and gives you a ripe excuse to avoid inconvenient things, like your in-law's barbeque when the 'pollen index' is too high.

But I really am allergic to the buggers. I used to routinely get bites that would swell as large as golf balls, fully three-dimensional monsters. On one grand occasion I had to go for X-rays after a softball game because the coach thought I'd broken my hand in the field. Turns out I'd simply been bitten by a mosquito and had the whole  hand swell. Nowadays it's toned down quite a bit.

But when you are covered head to toe in mosquito bites, for me at least, it's more than itching. It's fatigue and shortness of breath and swelling, and it sucks. Benadryl helped, but there was an undercurrent of blah most of the day.

Anywho, despite appearances this was all of 5% of the day. In the early afternoon Lisa and her friend joined me and most of the kids as we hit the rummage sales in the area. The sales were largely void of books, but Lisa scored big at a clothing rummage.

And at another rummage I was so put off by one woman's constant refrain to her partner of "Did they pay for X? Did you charge them for Y?"  that I looked her in the face and told her I wasn't a thief. I don't know what she was so hyped up about, most of the stuff was worth about as much as a campaign promise, but she still wound up with $8 in sales.

[I say 'most of the kids' joined us because for the most part YaYa was AWOL with the 11 year old most of the weekend, to be seen only at dinner and bedtime. She rode the horses, she petted the bull, and she rode her bike, all day long.] 

Then we stopped off at a store called Pamida, which is basically like a small K-Mart. I'd never heard of it before, but they had very good store-brand diapers for very little cash. Smiley had a hissy there because I wouldn't buy him a set of water pistols, but otherwise it was a neat experience.

Later that afternoon we all drove into a nearby town for ice cream.

Milty Wilty is a drive in that's been in business since 1947. Their custard fails to trump Leon's here in Milwaukee, but that's besides the point. Leon's doesn't have an expansive set of play equipment for their customer's kids.

They even had a bouncing castle.

It was very relaxing to just sit out in the sun and enjoy your custard and conversation while the kids played.

As we were about to leave the kids found an injured butterfly in the parking lot.

Our original intention had been to attend a 5 pm parade in another town, but we ran late at the ice cream stand. So we returned to the house. One group of kids swam while LuLu asked me to watch her bicycle in the front yard. I did so, utilizing the 'flip the back bench over to create a tailgate seat' on the Freestar. Booyah!

At one point something came over me and I asked the 11 year old if I could use her bike. After adjusting the seat I took off on my first real bike ride in (seriously) 25 years. Oh, I'd hopped on a bike last year for a quick second, but that was diddly. This time I went for several minutes, at a pretty decent speed, and actually whipped around much as I did back in my childhood.

It might have helped that YaYa was egging me on and taunting me the whole time. :)

Maybe we'll buy some bikes as the summer progresses. It was fun, and good exercise of course; plus it would give us quality time with the kids.

Tacos for supper, and then the kids retired to watch a movie. I joined the friend's husband on the pier for some fishing (and caught two bluegill - the FIRST TIME I'd legitimately caught a fish on my own in all my 34 years. I had caught one last year, but with one of the kids joining me on the pole).

Later, Lisa and her friend went to visit her (friend's) Mom's bar in a nearby town (and came within a few feet of colliding with a deer on the return trip when it bolted from the woods. Credit her friend's sharp driving for avoiding disaster).

While they were at the bar we took turns playing Tour of Duty 4 and MLB '08  The Show on Playstation 3.

[In the latter game I drafted and managed a team that went 102-60, only to be swept in the first round of the playoffs by the Royals.

By the bleepin' Royals! Can you believe it?]

Then it was on to bed when Lisa returned, and another fine day gone by. That swim, riding a bike, and catching a fish, all in one day.

 Huh. Good day for firsts eh?