Today was day one of beach trip number two. Number two was a theme for the day, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Yesterday, we drove here to Garden City, near Myrtle Beach, from our home in the upstate of South Carolina: the two kids, the husband, the hamster, and me. The cats don’t much care for car rides and therefore had to stay home, where they will engage in all sorts of mischief while we are gone, including knocking over their food container, chasing each other all over the house while simultaneously scratching the hardwood floors, and chewing up all the house plants and puking them up on the scratched hardwood floors. The hamster was a last minute packing decision, based on my younger daughter S’s big watery puppy dog eyes and the fact that we had room for his cage in the back seat. It turns out that hamsters don’t really much care for car rides either. Maximus, the dwarf hamster, hiccuped vomity burps for the rest of the night. If you Google “hamster smells like vomit,” you will end up wondering if you should take the rodent to the emergency vet clinic or if he will be dead in his cage by dawn’s early light.
Maximus was fine this morning, feeling frisky and biting anything that was shoved in his face, especially fingers and lips. S felt confident that he would survive, so we got all sunscreened, grabbed our chairs and buckets and books, and walked out to the beach. My husband and older daughter, E, were not ready to leave the confines of the 800 square foot condo, what with the pleasures of unmade beds and iPads calling them, so S and I were solo. We half-heartedly made wet sand castles and jumped waves until our mouths and eyes were salt rimmed and burning. My spouse came out, and we all went back in the water. We waded to about our knees when a wayward jellyfish floated close enough to us to make all of us run back to our chairs, as if it could consciously chase after us and not just bob along with the tide.
E chose that moment to join us on the sand, right when we decided we had enough of the grainy stuff, so we left the beach and went up to the pool. About twenty rednecks and their inbred offspring were screaming and splashing around in it, so E decided she would rather go back to the condo. I walked with her because I had to pee; the jellyfish sighting thwarted my plans of answering the call of nature while wave jumping. As we walked past the stairwell towards the back of the building, the most horrible stench wafted up, assaulting our nostrils with a smell so bad we both started gagging. It wasn’t the kind of smell you wanted to smell again to determine its origin. It was the kind of smell that made you wonder if someone’s grandma had been missing for a few weeks, only they forgot to check the family vacation home.
After using the facilities and smelling the Febreze spray to cleanse my nasal palette, I walked back to the pool alone, this time open-mouth breathing. When I made it past the stairwell again, I discovered the source of the foul stink. On the concrete, under the stairs, was a humongous turd, a turd so big there was no doubt it was not a cat’s or dog’s or even a child’s. That thing was man-sized, and from the looks of it, was a long time coming.
I appreciate the fact that when you gotta go, you gotta go. But the stairwell? It’s not a port-a-potty, or a public restroom, or even a bush. It’s the stairwell. People walk up and down the stairs to get to their units. In fact, all the condos have two toilets, which meant that whoever the public crapper was had access to not one but two separate commodes in which to lay that pipe. I know, I know, walking up the stairs is such a chore, especially when there is so much fun to be had at the beach. Or when you have to take a dump really badly.
When I got back to the pool, my husband decided he had had enough of the sun and went inside to get some lunch. I sat on a lounge chair watching the redneck children throw water balloons in the pool and yell at each other in some bastardized version of the Queen’s tongue. S decided that she was done as well, so we rushed past the poop and back to our unit.
We dined on frozen food and sandwiches and organic strawberries, fed tiny bits of romaine to Maximus, scanned the crappy cable channels, and generally got on each other’s nerves until we were ready to attempt another jaunt down to the sand. After reapplying sunscreen and refreshing the water bottle, we walked back outside.
Luckily, someone had kindly cleaned up the human waste, although I doubt it was its owner, but at least the sun-baked excrement and the resulting stench had cleared up. When we got back to our chairs, we realized the tide had come in faster than we expected it, so we had to pick up all of our stuff and move it back twenty paces. We settled in the chairs but then realized that the wind had also come in, so we had to reposition ourselves with our backs to the gusts. That way the stinging sand could embed itself in our scalps instead of our eyes.
When we were finally comfortable, we heard the unmistakable sound of summer: thunder. Loud, booming cannon fire thunder. The kind of thunder that makes you scream like a little girl. We sat still, just in case we heard wrong, but we hadn’t. The thunder boomed again, louder this time, and when we looked towards the building, we could see massive gray clouds sneaking up behind it.
We packed up everything. I grabbed the beach bag and a chair. My husband got his cup and the other chairs. S bent down to grab the buckets and shovels while E picked up the beach umbrella. Unfortunately, they stood up at the same time, and E clocked S right above her left eye with the sandy end, resulting in tears from both of them. By the time we hosed off, stacked the chairs by the door, and fought over who could take the first shower, the thunder had stopped.
I’d call that a successful first day at the beach, wouldn’t you?
Monday, June 27, 2011
Friday, June 17, 2011
Circus Maximus
We have a new addition to the family, and like many new additions, this one was unplanned. He is a dwarf hamster, which is his actual breed and not a derogatory term, and he is about the size of a quarter cup of almonds. He belonged to the daughters of my friend BD, but they needed a new home for him. Let me tell you that little story first, before I get to the part where he moved in with us.
BD’s home is like a three ring circus on any given day, but more so now that they have an actual menagerie. They started with the usual dog and cat, but this past Christmas, Santa, who must have been high at the time, brought the girls a turtle and a hamster. The turtle, Bob, does his turtle-y things in his tank and is fun to watch, but the hamster, Leroy, was a delight to the whole family. They loved Leroy so much that they decided they needed another hamster, so they went out and procured Jortsey, cleverly named after the uber popular denim shorts that all the kids are wearing.
Jortsey and Leroy are both males, and instead of starting a bromance, they declared full out hamster war on each other. The hamster habitat became Thunderdome; two hamsters entered, and only one was going to leave. As disappointing as it was to the entire D family, it was clear that there was no way that Jortsey and Leroy could live together under the same cage. Leroy was there first, so he had squatter’s rights. Jortsey had to pack his hamster ball and leave.
Now’s the part where my family comes in. My younger daughter, S, is in love with every hamster she has ever seen, and has spent many a day oohing and aahing over both Leroy and Jortsey. BD’s daughters decided if Jortsey had to go, then he had to go to S. BD worked hard on me, explaining how easy hamsters are to take care of, how little attention they need, how they don’t smell, and please just give it a try.
Against my better judgment, I agreed to let Jortsey move in with us. I secretly purchased a cage, a bag of treats, a bag of food, some chew toys, and a cardboard tube filled with fluff. I brought them home and showed them to my husband, who was barely on board with the plan.
“Why did you buy a bag of rat food?” he asked me.
“I didn’t. It’s hamster food,” I answered.
He held up the bag, pointing to the word rat.
“Well, I guess I have to take that back. It looked like a hamster on the bag. I guess I can’t tell a hamster from a rat.”
“How much was this toilet paper tube with the dryer lint stuffed inside?” he asked me, holding up the tube.
“It doesn’t matter. He’s going to love it.”
“How much?”
“It was less than a plastic igloo, which all the other hamsters at the store had,” I said. He put it down and stopped asking me questions.
We told the girls about the hamster a week before we got him. He was to be S’s graduation present. She finished her last year at her school and will be starting a new one in the fall. E will be starting a new school as well, but we got her an electric guitar for a graduation present. Just a tip: don’t buy your child an electric guitar unless you don’t mind listening to him or her play it.
Before we picked up Jortsey, I returned the rat food and got hamster food, and S picked out some tunnels for the cage as well as a yellow hamster ball, her favorite color. We got his cage nicely lined with wood chips, filled his little food dish and water bottle, and attached all the tunnels to the cage. Then we went over to BD’s house and brought home our little fluffy bundle of joy.
S laughed out loud the whole way home. She would giggle, then laugh, than smile, then repeat. She could not contain her pure joy. My older daughter, E, was less excited, and instead came up with all the ways the hamster could die in our home. The cats could eat him. He could get crushed under someone’s foot. He could get diarrhea from eating rat food. He could fall to his death. He could get sick and never recover. S finally asked her to stop, since she didn’t want to have nightmares about her new pet’s horrific demise.
Jortsey has adjusted well to his new cage and family. We might have confused him at first, since we changed his name to Maximus. Jortsey was a D family name. We needed a name that reflected our family, and irony is a hit around here. He has lived with us for a week now, and the novelty has yet to wear off. He is the first one S greets in the morning, and the last one she kisses good night. She is totally in love, and it appears to be mutual. When she opens his cage, he always comes out to see her. He does not do that for the rest of us. The rest of us have experienced the powerful force of hamster jaws clamping down on a finger tip.
Maximus’s turn-ons include: the nest he made by weaving wood chips into the dryer fluff; kisses on the nose; sunflower seeds; the yellow hamster ball; and pooping in E’s hands. His turn-offs include: being pulled out of his tunnel; being pulled out of his nest; being pulled off of the hamster wheel; and being placed in a plastic bin so he can sit on the couch with the family and watch TV.
The cats love to watch Maximus in his cage. They will sit outside of it for hours, staring and waiting. They have not yet turned against him and seem more curious than hamstercidal. They are not the only ones who sit and watch him. Every night, after the kids go to bed, I slink into the room where we keep his cage, sit on a stool, and watch him sleep. He senses me there and pokes his little nose out of the fluff. Sometimes he will waddle over and say hello, and sometimes he reburies himself. It is better than a television show. Usually, my husband joins me, grinning much like S did on that first drive home. He always wanted a hamster, but his mom wouldn’t let him have one.
That cardboard tube with the fluff? That was the best $1.99 I ever spent.
BD’s home is like a three ring circus on any given day, but more so now that they have an actual menagerie. They started with the usual dog and cat, but this past Christmas, Santa, who must have been high at the time, brought the girls a turtle and a hamster. The turtle, Bob, does his turtle-y things in his tank and is fun to watch, but the hamster, Leroy, was a delight to the whole family. They loved Leroy so much that they decided they needed another hamster, so they went out and procured Jortsey, cleverly named after the uber popular denim shorts that all the kids are wearing.
Jortsey and Leroy are both males, and instead of starting a bromance, they declared full out hamster war on each other. The hamster habitat became Thunderdome; two hamsters entered, and only one was going to leave. As disappointing as it was to the entire D family, it was clear that there was no way that Jortsey and Leroy could live together under the same cage. Leroy was there first, so he had squatter’s rights. Jortsey had to pack his hamster ball and leave.
Now’s the part where my family comes in. My younger daughter, S, is in love with every hamster she has ever seen, and has spent many a day oohing and aahing over both Leroy and Jortsey. BD’s daughters decided if Jortsey had to go, then he had to go to S. BD worked hard on me, explaining how easy hamsters are to take care of, how little attention they need, how they don’t smell, and please just give it a try.
Against my better judgment, I agreed to let Jortsey move in with us. I secretly purchased a cage, a bag of treats, a bag of food, some chew toys, and a cardboard tube filled with fluff. I brought them home and showed them to my husband, who was barely on board with the plan.
“Why did you buy a bag of rat food?” he asked me.
“I didn’t. It’s hamster food,” I answered.
He held up the bag, pointing to the word rat.
“Well, I guess I have to take that back. It looked like a hamster on the bag. I guess I can’t tell a hamster from a rat.”
“How much was this toilet paper tube with the dryer lint stuffed inside?” he asked me, holding up the tube.
“It doesn’t matter. He’s going to love it.”
“How much?”
“It was less than a plastic igloo, which all the other hamsters at the store had,” I said. He put it down and stopped asking me questions.
We told the girls about the hamster a week before we got him. He was to be S’s graduation present. She finished her last year at her school and will be starting a new one in the fall. E will be starting a new school as well, but we got her an electric guitar for a graduation present. Just a tip: don’t buy your child an electric guitar unless you don’t mind listening to him or her play it.
Before we picked up Jortsey, I returned the rat food and got hamster food, and S picked out some tunnels for the cage as well as a yellow hamster ball, her favorite color. We got his cage nicely lined with wood chips, filled his little food dish and water bottle, and attached all the tunnels to the cage. Then we went over to BD’s house and brought home our little fluffy bundle of joy.
S laughed out loud the whole way home. She would giggle, then laugh, than smile, then repeat. She could not contain her pure joy. My older daughter, E, was less excited, and instead came up with all the ways the hamster could die in our home. The cats could eat him. He could get crushed under someone’s foot. He could get diarrhea from eating rat food. He could fall to his death. He could get sick and never recover. S finally asked her to stop, since she didn’t want to have nightmares about her new pet’s horrific demise.
Jortsey has adjusted well to his new cage and family. We might have confused him at first, since we changed his name to Maximus. Jortsey was a D family name. We needed a name that reflected our family, and irony is a hit around here. He has lived with us for a week now, and the novelty has yet to wear off. He is the first one S greets in the morning, and the last one she kisses good night. She is totally in love, and it appears to be mutual. When she opens his cage, he always comes out to see her. He does not do that for the rest of us. The rest of us have experienced the powerful force of hamster jaws clamping down on a finger tip.
Maximus’s turn-ons include: the nest he made by weaving wood chips into the dryer fluff; kisses on the nose; sunflower seeds; the yellow hamster ball; and pooping in E’s hands. His turn-offs include: being pulled out of his tunnel; being pulled out of his nest; being pulled off of the hamster wheel; and being placed in a plastic bin so he can sit on the couch with the family and watch TV.
The cats love to watch Maximus in his cage. They will sit outside of it for hours, staring and waiting. They have not yet turned against him and seem more curious than hamstercidal. They are not the only ones who sit and watch him. Every night, after the kids go to bed, I slink into the room where we keep his cage, sit on a stool, and watch him sleep. He senses me there and pokes his little nose out of the fluff. Sometimes he will waddle over and say hello, and sometimes he reburies himself. It is better than a television show. Usually, my husband joins me, grinning much like S did on that first drive home. He always wanted a hamster, but his mom wouldn’t let him have one.
That cardboard tube with the fluff? That was the best $1.99 I ever spent.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Off the Beaten Path
My husband recently celebrated his birthday, cementing the fact that for a few months, he is in fact older than me. He decided, like most of us, that working on his birthday constituted cruel and unusual punishment, and therefore, he took the day off, sticking it to the man. Since he is self-employed, he is just sticking it to himself, whatever it is, but a day off every once and again is a good thing, or so I have heard. I asked him what he wanted to do with his special day, and he decided he wanted to go hiking with me. The kids would be in school, and we would have a few hours to enjoy nature and each other’s company. Why the fuck not? I thought, and agreed to the plan.
Of course, I had to alter it just a bit to satisfy my own needs for the day. After all, it was a Monday, the stay-at-home mom’s Saturday, and while I wanted him to enjoy his special day, I didn’t want to give up mine. So I gently encouraged him to sleep in so I could do one class at the gym before our date with the great outdoors began. I left him snoozing happily, drove the girls to school, and sweat my ass off in combat class, trying my best to not hit like a girl. I returned home by 10am, just in time to freshen my water bottle and slide into the passenger seat of my husband’s car.
We drove to Paris Mountain State Park, paid our admission fee sanctimoniously, as state budget cuts have done away with gate attendants, and headed towards the parking lot near our favorite trail head. I know there are plenty of other trails in the park, but we always come to this spot, where the reservoir is, and sort of meander until we decide we have had enough. Generally speaking, that means an hour of hiking, enough to work up a dewy sweat and feel like we deserve whatever crap we decide on for lunch. I was still full of energy and endorphins following my combat class, so we hustled our way along the trail, past the water feature, over rocks and tree roots and muddy patches, until we got to where the trail splits.
One direction headed toward the former fire tower; the other direction headed towards another loop that would mean a good two hours of hiking on an unfamiliar trail. My husband checked the GPS on his smart phone and decided the fire tower trail was the way to go, so we scampered off in that direction, reaching the ruins in little time. I was starting to get hungry, and we had finished most of our water bottle, when his phone rang.
There is something odd about having a phone conversation in the middle of the woods, especially by the remains of what was once a fairly isolated ranger post. But it was his birthday, and the call was from one of his oldest friends, and so my husband began chatting, catching up, accepting birthday wishes, making plans, that sort of thing. Feeling a bit bored, I texted for entertainment on my dumb phone, walking along behind him, as he was deep in discussion about finances or futures or whatever I was no longer listening to.
We followed what we thought was the trail. A few trees had fallen down over the pathway, which I thought was odd, since this was hardly an isolated or unused park. We stepped over logs, found more forks, tried to decide right or left, and continued walking until it was perfectly clear that we were not only no longer on the fire tower trail, we were not on any trail at all.
I was so certain we weren’t on a trail anymore because we appeared to be in someone’s back yard. We weren’t on anyone’s actual lawn, but a row of large custom-built houses were well within walking distance. I doubted we were still in the park. More likely, it was neighborhood easement property, the buffer between those yards we espied and state owned grounds. I stopped texting, my husband ended his phone call, and we looked at each other. We were lost.
I didn’t want to ruin my husband’s birthday by freaking out on him, but seriously, we had been hiking for an hour and a half, after I had already exercised for a good hour. It was lunchtime, I had to be in the car pool line in less than two hours with snacks and piano books, and we had no fucking idea where we were. Let me rephrase that. I had no fucking idea where we were.
My husband had an inkling, and, as you may recall, GPS on his phone, which he may have forgotten to consult while chatting but now was free to use. Only reception, you know, is not always what you would like it to be while in a remote part of the park, off the trail. He attempted to access the trail maps on the park’s website, but who had that kind of time to wait for a download? Instead, he oriented himself, a skill I do not possess, and we began walking in what he felt was the right direction. I can’t say I didn’t believe him, only that I had no fucking idea which was the right direction, so I did what he told me to do.
I didn’t want to yell at him, because why was it only his fault that we were lost? Oh wait; he was the one with the GPS. Well, I didn’t want to yell at him because it was his birthday. So I cried silently to myself as I stumbled behind him, imagining every worst case scenario my overactive mind could produce. We were out of water. We had no food. He had a general idea of where our car was, but I had no fucking idea. And we had an hour to get there before my carpool deadline. Clearly, that plan of a smugly indulgent post-hike lunch was out of the question. I only hoped we would not have to resort to cannibalism.
I imagined one of us falling off the mountain. I imagined us wandering around until dark, our children waiting solemnly at their schools, wondering why Mom didn't pick them up when all the other mommies picked up their children. I imagined who would raise them if we were never found alive.
Despite my worst fears, my husband successfully steered us back to a trail, way off from where we thought we were or meant to be. We had a good hour to go until we would reach our car in the parking lot. That jovial mood we begin our hike with morphed into all the joy of the Bataan death march as we worked our way along the trail back to the main road, which we then followed back to the parking lot. My legs shook for the last half hour. Combat and getting lost during a hike do not mix. My husband knew I used what little strength I had left to not lose it, and for that, he was truly grateful.
We made it home in time for me to grab raw food out of the fridge, shove it in my mouth, and chewing it while in the shower. I got in the car pool line with all the necessary items a mere ten minutes before the school bell rang and the afternoon activities began. Meanwhile, my husband enjoyed his quiet afternoon at home alone, relaxing after a long birthday hike.
Next year, I am suggesting a movie.
Of course, I had to alter it just a bit to satisfy my own needs for the day. After all, it was a Monday, the stay-at-home mom’s Saturday, and while I wanted him to enjoy his special day, I didn’t want to give up mine. So I gently encouraged him to sleep in so I could do one class at the gym before our date with the great outdoors began. I left him snoozing happily, drove the girls to school, and sweat my ass off in combat class, trying my best to not hit like a girl. I returned home by 10am, just in time to freshen my water bottle and slide into the passenger seat of my husband’s car.
We drove to Paris Mountain State Park, paid our admission fee sanctimoniously, as state budget cuts have done away with gate attendants, and headed towards the parking lot near our favorite trail head. I know there are plenty of other trails in the park, but we always come to this spot, where the reservoir is, and sort of meander until we decide we have had enough. Generally speaking, that means an hour of hiking, enough to work up a dewy sweat and feel like we deserve whatever crap we decide on for lunch. I was still full of energy and endorphins following my combat class, so we hustled our way along the trail, past the water feature, over rocks and tree roots and muddy patches, until we got to where the trail splits.
One direction headed toward the former fire tower; the other direction headed towards another loop that would mean a good two hours of hiking on an unfamiliar trail. My husband checked the GPS on his smart phone and decided the fire tower trail was the way to go, so we scampered off in that direction, reaching the ruins in little time. I was starting to get hungry, and we had finished most of our water bottle, when his phone rang.
There is something odd about having a phone conversation in the middle of the woods, especially by the remains of what was once a fairly isolated ranger post. But it was his birthday, and the call was from one of his oldest friends, and so my husband began chatting, catching up, accepting birthday wishes, making plans, that sort of thing. Feeling a bit bored, I texted for entertainment on my dumb phone, walking along behind him, as he was deep in discussion about finances or futures or whatever I was no longer listening to.
We followed what we thought was the trail. A few trees had fallen down over the pathway, which I thought was odd, since this was hardly an isolated or unused park. We stepped over logs, found more forks, tried to decide right or left, and continued walking until it was perfectly clear that we were not only no longer on the fire tower trail, we were not on any trail at all.
I was so certain we weren’t on a trail anymore because we appeared to be in someone’s back yard. We weren’t on anyone’s actual lawn, but a row of large custom-built houses were well within walking distance. I doubted we were still in the park. More likely, it was neighborhood easement property, the buffer between those yards we espied and state owned grounds. I stopped texting, my husband ended his phone call, and we looked at each other. We were lost.
I didn’t want to ruin my husband’s birthday by freaking out on him, but seriously, we had been hiking for an hour and a half, after I had already exercised for a good hour. It was lunchtime, I had to be in the car pool line in less than two hours with snacks and piano books, and we had no fucking idea where we were. Let me rephrase that. I had no fucking idea where we were.
My husband had an inkling, and, as you may recall, GPS on his phone, which he may have forgotten to consult while chatting but now was free to use. Only reception, you know, is not always what you would like it to be while in a remote part of the park, off the trail. He attempted to access the trail maps on the park’s website, but who had that kind of time to wait for a download? Instead, he oriented himself, a skill I do not possess, and we began walking in what he felt was the right direction. I can’t say I didn’t believe him, only that I had no fucking idea which was the right direction, so I did what he told me to do.
I didn’t want to yell at him, because why was it only his fault that we were lost? Oh wait; he was the one with the GPS. Well, I didn’t want to yell at him because it was his birthday. So I cried silently to myself as I stumbled behind him, imagining every worst case scenario my overactive mind could produce. We were out of water. We had no food. He had a general idea of where our car was, but I had no fucking idea. And we had an hour to get there before my carpool deadline. Clearly, that plan of a smugly indulgent post-hike lunch was out of the question. I only hoped we would not have to resort to cannibalism.
I imagined one of us falling off the mountain. I imagined us wandering around until dark, our children waiting solemnly at their schools, wondering why Mom didn't pick them up when all the other mommies picked up their children. I imagined who would raise them if we were never found alive.
Despite my worst fears, my husband successfully steered us back to a trail, way off from where we thought we were or meant to be. We had a good hour to go until we would reach our car in the parking lot. That jovial mood we begin our hike with morphed into all the joy of the Bataan death march as we worked our way along the trail back to the main road, which we then followed back to the parking lot. My legs shook for the last half hour. Combat and getting lost during a hike do not mix. My husband knew I used what little strength I had left to not lose it, and for that, he was truly grateful.
We made it home in time for me to grab raw food out of the fridge, shove it in my mouth, and chewing it while in the shower. I got in the car pool line with all the necessary items a mere ten minutes before the school bell rang and the afternoon activities began. Meanwhile, my husband enjoyed his quiet afternoon at home alone, relaxing after a long birthday hike.
Next year, I am suggesting a movie.
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