Sharks, Experi-ents, and Stuff

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

So much for Wednesday tutoring.
Francis was on an all-day bike ride with a buddy.
Linnea was apparently “off school” for June.

“Grandma! A camel has all kinds of water in him and hay on his face! He can drink a whole bathtub in a minute!”
Close, bud. Close…
He dragged a purple cardboard box from his backpack in which he had stuffed his white collared shirt. He put it on over his current ensemble…
“Did you dress him like Babe Ruth at church?” Linnea laughed.
“I’m doing experi-ents today,” Puck explained.
“Like Uncle Relevance?” Carrie asked him. “Did you know that Uncle Relevance is a mad scientist?”
“What?”
“Yup. He does experiments all day long.”
This transferred into conversation about Carrie’s morning ritual – having Mom bring her one of the buns while she guessed – from hearing alone – which one it was.
“What’s in the Puck and Grandma box, Grandma?”
“Close your eyes. Guess what it is.”
She handed the object to him…
“A rake!”
Indeed. A $2.97 child-sized garden rake, which Puck would certainly use to dig to the center of the earth.

Toting out a tub of sunflower seeds to the car for quick-access, Carrie was joined by Collette for some morning shopping.
Apparently the whole American Indian thing was really “in” those days.
“I’ve heard reports about hipsters wearing full headdresses down in The Loop,” Carrie noted.

Back on the ranch, Puck cut his thumb on the tab of his seltzer water, which he had opened himself for the first time, Sunday. Carrie, breaking for lunch over another “Say Yes to the Dress”, was joined by Puck, cradling his battle-finger in a bloodied cloth. Talk of white gowns and tears was intermittently hyphenated by Puck’s observations of the healing process…
“This dot of blood at the end is the biggest!”
“This is going to be the biggest blood dot!”
“See all that blood on there!”
Before his reading lesson, Puck was inspired to add yet one more disgusting thing to his grand Collection of Puck…
“I want to keep this!” Puck announced, holding up a piece of the blood-tissue.
“Oh you can’t do that,” Carrie replied.
“Why?”
“Because sharks like blood.”
After a lengthy discussion on this matter, Puck tossed the cloth.

Another shopping run – this time with Mom, while Linnea cranked out another set of volleyball at the Renaud Center – brought them to Target under a Native American afternoon sky of clouds.
Juice at QT – Simply Apple for Collette.
A firefly stole a ride on the way across to Chesterfield.

Joe called before six from his hammock, recounting the hike up to the highest point in New Mexico the previous afternoon, returning with a little heat exhaustion to consume an entire 12-inch pizza.

“There’s a 50-50 chance I will wake up morbidly sick tomorrow,” OLeif groaned somewhere after inning 9 that night.
Silence.
“So… tell me the truth, here,” Collette replied, after giving him time to revoke the joke. “What sort of disaster do I have to prepare myself for here?”
OLeif, who had already smashed himself deep into a mountain of pillows, replied…
“Collette. If I say anything about narwhals, you have to wake me up.”
Apparently someone else had caught Collette’s cold.