36 : The Waiting Game

I took the boys with me for a brief visit out in Dardenne Prairie that morning. My first childhood friend, now a healthcare reporter for the Washington Examiner, was back in town for a few days, bringing her own two kids along for the ride. Kids and kids got acquainted while we swapped life updates.

First, though, we’d stopped for go-carts with Uncle Francis and another junk hunt for Puck. He can never go too many days without dumpster diving. Today it was Grandma Snicketts’ ancient white suitcase rescued from the enormous dumpster sitting in the driveway waiting pick-up.

Forty-five minutes later, back on the road for more house research and to put macaroni and cheese in the boys. Five minutes after the meal was completed, Puck was ready to add on more nourishment.

“Mom, can I have a snack?”

By mid-afternoon, both boys were ready for some energy depletion.

“Yali! What do you want to do now?”

“Hmm…” he pondered.

“Let’s go do somersaults on the bed!”

“Bed?”

“Yeah!”

“Yeah!”

Meanwhile, Rose had been in Colorado for the past four days with friends. After attempting to summit a mountain following a 14K hike, she texted all the siblings with the following message at about five o’clock:

“…almost fell down the mountain, only thing that saved me was my hiking stick. It’s all bent now.”

Oxbear picked us up for a spontaneous Chick-Fil-A dinner after work and a drive back home to add brighter lightbulbs to the basement. After eight potential buyers had visited the old homestead, about the worst complaint received so far was “squeaky floorboards”. So we made plans to hole up another night at Theodore’s and Gloria’s.

When we got back, I tucked Yali into the king-sized for the night. He wasn’t having anything to do with the Zzzz’s though. He was nothing but slap-happy. Fake snore. Hysterical belly laugh. More fake snoring. More hysterical belly-laughing. Eventually Oxbear took over supervising this cackling little cocoa bean so he, too, could participate in the fun.