Ferry the girl away...

My son. You'd think that a kid would WANT to start summer camp. They would WANT to skip the last day of school (half day on a MONDAY, who does that!?) and go straight to camp. But not Geoff. I told him that he was going to camp and he freaked out "but I won't see my friends again! I'll miss learning something! What if they teach something I need for the rest of my life!" Oh! The DRAMA of preadolescent youth!

Dude, more than half of them are going to the same camp. In fact, my guess is more than half of them will not be in school today, they'll be... AT CAMP! As for missing something, he just doesn't really get the fact that there ain't no book learnin' goin' down in no school today. It's the last day. It's a HALF day.

Man. My son...

So he went to school. I'm going to pick him up at about 10am, drive him over, get him acclimated, pat him on his pointed little head and wish the staff luck.

This should be interesting.

I am glad I'm staying home this morning, I am just plain worn out. Between the Geoff drama and our weekend adventures, I need just a few minutes to breathe, and do dishes.

And write a journal entry.

Today's quote of the moment is dedicated to Jessica. Read it, over there in the left side bar, and come back here. Okay. Explanation:

Jessica likes to sniff me. Yes. I said that. Jessica will be sitting on the couch next to me, and she'll lean over, stick her nose on my shirt and inhale. Sniffffffffff! I have NO idea where this came from, but it cracks me up and then we get into this whole "You may not sniff your mommy!" argument and I push her and she sniffs me. It's weird. It is one of those truly Jessica-Christine weirdnesses that I don't honestly expect anyone on earth to understand, comprehend, get.

She says she likes the smell of our laundry, and that sniffing Geoff or Dad is just weird. And sniffing me isn't? Whatever.

Yesterday on the ferry, we were getting ready to deboat and she sniffed me and said "You Stink."

What! Little brat! How dare she. "I do not stink."

Then she starts laughing and says "You stink. Yes you do. You smell like beef and cheese. You don't smell like Santa." If you don't recognize the quote, it's from the movie Elf and Will Ferrell's character, Buddy Elf, says it to the store Santa in the department store where he is "working." So she and I bust out laughing our asses off. Doug standing behind us, looking at us wanly as if to say "How did I get myself into this mess."

Speaking of busting out laughing, I got a phone call on Saturday from my old friend Dr. Bobby K, professor extrordinaire at some university, somewhere in the USA. Ole Rob there is just dying laughing, and I can't understand a word he is saying. Finally he gets out, "I've been laughing for 48 hours -- I had to call you and tell you why."

Rob was in a pet store in his current state somewhere in America, buying dog food for ole Cooper Dog. He went to pay the man at the register for said canine victuals. Suddenly he hears the in-store music playing "Easy Lover" by Philip Bailey and Phil Collins. And he uncontrollably busts out laughing in the cashier's face -- he cannot stop laughing.

The poor guy at the register must have been quite confused. But in his mind's eye, Rob sees me sitting in the passenger's seat of his car in like 1984, singing into the "mic" in my hand "She's a sleazy mother..." in a high, fake falsetto mocking tone.

And he can't stop laughing.

So there is he is, two days later, still laughing. He said to me "I look back on those things we used to do, and we were funny. God, we were so funny."

Sometimes when 17 and 18 year olds are together, they think they're funny. More often than not, they are just funny in the moment. But. If they can get to age 38 and they are suddenly swept over by how ridiculously funny something was 20 years ago, and they can't stop laughing, you know that shit was true. True funny.

We were funny. We were damn funny beyond any shadow of a doubt. The crap we would do and sing and joke about was just downright juvenile and really funny. I wish to hell that I'd had a camcorder back then, to tape Rob stomping on the brakes and beeping the horn in rhythm to the Eagles' "Heartache Tonight" as I sang out the windows through all of downtown Huntington NY on a hotassed summer night.

Rob thinks he's lost his funny. I don't think so. I laugh my ass off still when we talk on the phone, and let me tell you -- God bless the phone. I seriously would have no friends on this earth if it weren't for the damn phone. We can laugh ass off about Geoff stories (I told Rob the bungee cord wedgie story and he just about died) and all kinds of stuff... he's still funny. He just needs a proper venue.

Bobby K -- this one's for you! Sing it with me now, brothers and sisters! "She's a sleazy mother, She’ll take your heart but you won’t feel it..."

Yesterday we drove Jessica down to drop her off with my parents. It was a long round trip, but we had a lot of fun during the day.

We actually got out the door 10 minutes before we planned... which, for those of you who know and love us, is a very rare event indeed. We missed one ferry by mere seconds.

The ferry ride over was cloudy and cold so we stayed in the cabin. I enjoy the ferry ride when it is hot hot hot and sunny. Crashing out on the upper deck and just enjoying the rays and tanning my feet -- that's the life. We met Grandma and Grampa in Port Jefferson, ate a great lunch at Papa Joe's right in town. Enjoyed the company, the beer, and the nice breeze. Port Jeff was certainly nicer weatherwise than New England was.

We then did some geocaches. One really tricky one right behind the restaurant, and another quick and easy one by the docks in the guardrail.

We did a third that required some more walking, so Doug and I went off to do that while the kids had ice cream with Grandma and Grampa. God bless Grandma and Grampa! The park where this one was hidden is under construction, and at first I didn't think we were going to be able to access the site.

There was a huge fence, and keep out signs everywhere, but then I saw this opening in the fence with a nice walkway to a statue... hmmmm. So we went in. It was a tricky find, but find it we did. Then we enjoyed combing for beach glass along the shore. A ferry came, and we could have hustled back and gotten the boy, but we took our time. We caught the next one after taking my parents for a nice walk all around downtown, checking out little stores and listening to South American pan flute music in the square.

The ride home seemed to take a million years more than the ride down. We eventually made it back. Our deck stairs still need fixed. So we're using Jessica's front door to get in the house, which is confusing the dogs. Doug said he'll come home from work early and get the deck fixed.

Geoff's cub scout den has their 'year end reward' for good behavior today. They're playing Laser Tag, and it should be tons of fun. I am hoping to go straight from work over there, seeing as I'm not at work now... it'd be good to stay at the office until 6 and then drive over... thus making up some time.

But I may come home first at 4 and get Geoff from camp, give Doug some time to maybe fix the deck, that way we don't need to sit in the dark with flashlights and bug spray.

That's the muppet update over here. I hope all y'all had a good weekend.