28 DEC 25
On a day that will swing from 78 degrees to 17 overnight...
...and we're not minutes out of the church service before “someone” has left the words “HELLFIRE CLUB” Sharpied on my hand-carved floor mirror from India... “Yali?” // “I'm SORRY!”...
That can be figured out later... I have a dead bee garden to clip out before winter really arrives...
Puck bounces out for an early BLT... note the disorderly shock of wheat-colored hair squawking across his scalp... “Wow... your hair really does grow fast...” // “No it doesn't! I've got about six different genes working in tandem against me”...
With Puck guarding the castle... the rest of us leave in a scatter of low-racing cloud under patched sun for New Years week goodies...
Some kind of mega dis-coordination is in the air though... we're halfway through Aldi and already the kids are tripping back and forth around us... close-calls with nearby shoppers...
...and Patience suddenly decides to stop the whole exiting line of customers and carts to double-back-and-gawk at a stack of free circulars by the door...
Waiting in line for Oxbear to renew the Costco membership... Yali is apparently overly stimulated enough or maybe just bored enough to begin chewing on his sister's arm like some cannibal... “Yali stop eating your sister”...
...which then quickly becomes the kids stumbling around and over and behind us again in inexplicable plays... as Patience runs into my back over by the sliced meats... “Did you guys forget how to walk?”...
...waiting at the cafe for late lunch... Yali returns to gnawing on the sleeve of my jacket waiting on a slice of pepperoni pizza... hooks the cloth onto his braces and stands there stuck for awhile before dismantling the snagged threads from his bracket...
Still... we successfully leave three stores in an avalanche of chicken strips mozzarella sticks taquitos calzones chicken alfredo street tacos spinach and artichoke dip Simply juices chocolate stuffed pastries Nutella packs chocolate peanut butter fudge ice cream sandwiches brownie bites apple caramels goodness... throw in a few packs of blood oranges and bell peppers to “balance”... as Puck calls with a question of one syllable... “Food?”...
Ride back with my little cavemen in a Noahic burst of sun shafts and rain cloud unfallen...
...where Oxbear starts a bonfire in a wind too high for fires but what's life without a little “risky crafting”...
...Yali tumbling through woodsmoke chasing the dog around a soggy yard as the wind pushes colder and colder...
...and inside for honey gold lamps and the quiet splash of my new tabletop fountain for Christmas... a Chinese Medieval playlist on Spotify as the wind boils higher and higher... the “lazy week” begins...