August 5th
Wednesday was covered in mist, from one visible horizon to the next.
“It’s smoking!” Puck called out when he opened the front door.
Over at the house, Puck watched Linnea turn cartwheels, somersaults, and handstands in the yard.
After returning inside, Puck tried some of his own handstands, sticking his head on the floor and his bum up in the air.
He was applauded for his efforts.
This was followed by him setting his little stuffed dinosaur (or ‘donkey’) on the live burner on the stove, which subsequently melted the fuzz off his feet and filled the kitchen with a peculiar odor.
“Mom got me my own personal steaks,” Francis told Collette with a grin as he mixed up a giant glass of chocolate milk and a huge bowl of scrambled eggs. “Because I always want something meaty.”
It wasn’t long after Puck’s sitting practice on the front porch, that he somehow managed to dismantle a firecracker (which happened to look like a box of black crayons) on Rose’s bed, spreading gunpowder all over her comforter.
And as it turned out, the big old green thing hadn’t quite been laid to rest. Not even after thirteen years. It was Judah who had figured it out that it would now only start up while in neutral. The kids were a little disappointed upon hearing this news. It was, after all, one of the more embarrassing vehicles to own. But it seemed as though there was some more life in it yet.
About three o’clock in the afternoon, Francis and Creole were debating whether or not to bike to Puff ‘o Lump’s house.
“You can’t bike all that way in this heat,” said Carrie. “It’s probably mostly uphill anyway.”
“It’s pretty much even, really,” said Creole.
“Well, maybe only like a thousand feet uphill,” said Francis.
“A thousand feet!” Collette laughed. “The St. Louis Arch is over 600.”
“Oh, well,” Francis grinned, realizing his error.
“I’ll drive you boys over,” said Carrie.
“Will you give me five dollars for food?” asked Francis.
“No,” said Carrie. “And on the way, you can run two CDs into the library for me.”
“That’s worth five dollars,” said Creole.
“We need food,” said Francis.
“Why don’t you just bring something from here?” Carrie asked. “There’s your steaks out there.”
“We ate those already,” said Francis. “We grilled them outside on the fire.”
“What? With no seasoning?”
“They were good,” said Creole. “They tasted like metal.”
“We could bring the cake mix,” said Francis. “We could make a fire in the fort and build a cake and grill it out there.”
The boys seemed to think that this was a good plan. But there was no car available yet for transport.
When everything had been settled out for the evening, Linnea was riding back home with Collette and Puck, to spend the night.
Once the squishy Puck had been put down in his nest, grinning happy dimples after being tickled by OLeif, Collette and Linnea walked out under gray-purple skies and sunbeams. Over to the library again.
When they returned, they watched crazy Japanese game shows on television, while OLeif went out to get treats and a Redbox Journey to the Center of the Earth, which was apparently actually filmed in Iceland, by the looks of the tell-tale terrain.