Movie Night

The next morning, OLeif was still feeling about the same.
“I don’t understand your stomach,” Collette told him.
It seemed to do battle with any number of foody substances over the years.

Puck, however, had little trouble hunting down food for the morning. As soon as he popped in the door at his grandma’s house, he headed for the fridge, just to look around.
“Mmmmmm…” he said. “Jelly!”
Then he tried to run off with a can of crescent rolls.

Meanwhile, OLeif opted to work from home while Collette and Francis joined everyone else (except for Dad and Joe), on a drive to Aunt Petunia’s house.
Puck had a running commentary during the half-hour drive. As they merged from 70 to 270:
“We’re goin’ round and round… and round and round again… Whoa!… Whoa!…”
And when they hit some potholes:
“We’re goin’ on some bumpers, Mama!”
“We gonna see Uncle Mo’s Christmas tree?” he asked Collette, as they neared, remembering it from Thanksgiving.
But the Christmas tree, long put away, was not the subject of interest. It was Aunt Petunia’s new puppy, Mila. When they arrived, she was already out in the front yard, jumping around through the snow. Aunt Petunia scooped her up and brought her inside where they all sat on the floor and played with her. Mila was excited to have such a large audience, and played ‘sit’ for treats.
“Can I hold her?” Puck asked.
He sat down in his grandma’s lap and held onto Mila for a few short moments, before Mila jumped away. Puck giggled. This was all a very silly act to watch, he thought.
They all took turns feeding Mila treats. Linus came out to join their circle, where Mila’s little kennel sat in the middle, decorated with pink water lily stickers, which Linus had stuck on it.

Half an hour later, or so, it was off to Grandma Combs’, where there was lunch and conversation, and pumpkin muffins. Grandma always pulled out the works, everything she had: soup, crackers, cookies, candies, the muffins, tea, etc. And Puck enjoyed playing with her stuffed tiger on the floor.

Back at the house, Francis had about an hour with Puck while the girls got some errands out of the way, including the library, Target, and Dierberg’s for supplies for Rose to make triple chocolate chip cake for her Memorial Bible study that night.

Then home for Collette and Puck, where OLeif was much better recovered, and ready to join them for movie night.
Collette handed him his emergency fresh supply of deodorant, direct from Target.
“Whew,” he said. “I smell better now. See, it’s confession time. I only pretended to be sick, because I smelled so bad.”
He grinned.

So Mom arrived with Francis and Linnea and their bags of school books.
Shortly after leaving, Collette received a phone call from Francis:
“Ummm, those zebra cakes on the counter? Is that our tribute for watching Puck?”
Collette laughed after the conversation had ended.
“That kid is always going to get what he wants,” she said. “He’s just too cute.”

At the house, shortly later, Bing walked in the door with two bottles of soda and a DVD collection. This time, it was easy to decide what to watch. A brief comedic musical from Bing’s stack, which, they had to admit, was just about the most hilarious black and white sketch they had ever seen. And: Bing’s and Rose’s first opportunity of watching: House on Haunted Hill.
But this was after Carrie had prepared a pot of tea for everyone. And Bing had presented them his cinematic composition of about eight minutes in length which he had submitted to a university in Chicago regarding their masters program.
They all agreed that it was very good. It reminded them of scores ranging anywhere from: Superman to Father of the Bride, Robin Hood, and Muppets Christmas Carol. They were impressed.
Then Rose returned in time for the feature film, as did Joe, from work. It was a very enjoyable evening, as were all their movie nights as an old group of friends.