This has been one craaaazy whirlwind month. Alright, alright, month and a half if you want to get particular about it, jeez your such a stickler.
In addition all the trips to LA I've taken recently for this and that, I decided to take a road trip with my five year old son and. my mother to visit the family in Seattle! Seventeen hours. In the car. With a five year old. Does the fun ever stop???
Actually he did really well, sure various toys, food bits and random items of clothing may have gone whizzing by my head from the backseat on occasion but all and all he was a stellar little traveler. But he should be, he's an old pro at this by now. He's driven across the country twice already (soon to add a third time come June) and I think this past trip will be his fourth drive from LA to Seattle. Pretty torturous for a energetic kid like mine to sit still for that long but man he was a trooper. I loaded up the car with library books, pens and snacks and just because I'm awesome like that I downloaded a SpongeBob movie for him on my kindle even though I don't let him watch that at home. I also let him eat Fruit Loops at the hotel breakfast bar. You may be saying to yourself, "Kristin, was that really wise to feed your child sugar cereal and and then strap him in to the car where he has to sit still for the next eight hours?" What can I say, I didn't think it through.
"Weeeeeeee! I LOVE FRUIT LOOPS!!!!!"
Although he did great these big car trips are the times I feel sorry for him that he's an only child. Oh the memories I have of my brother and I on these family vacations in the car (we drove from LA to Seattle at least once, sometimes twice a year to visit the family for as long as I can remember.) We became proficient at the I Spy game, stop looking out my window arguments.....and finally maybe the best skill you could learn during a long car trip with your sibling: how to deliver a righteous, well timed dead leg. Bums me out that Henry has no one to give a good dead leg to. I mean, I could give him one, but that just seems kind of mean.
The Family Truckster!
AAAANYWAY, Back to the trip. It was great to see all the family, we really do get along so great, it stinks we don't live closer. I even got to see my friend Janel that I grew up with, she made us a terrific lunch, we reminisced about grade school days and then she busted out her 6 grade sticker collection which, I'll be honest with you, I debated stealing it was so cool. She had friggen E.T. stickers. E.T! What a classic. I'll have to see what's in my own collection, maybe we can work out a trade with some of my bitchen scratch n' sniff.
The trip, despite that damn rain and cloudy weather Seattle is famous for but makes me want to hang myself in the shower, was fun. We got to spend Easter Sunday with all the aunts, uncles, cousins and my ninety two year old grandmother who, although hard of hearing still tries to join in all the fun. Grandma has had very adventurous life, she and grandpa raised four kids on a farm (my mom still brags how she learned to drive on a tractor) and traveled the world together. Her name used to be spelled Betty but she changed it to Bette after being inspired by the famous actress of the day Bette Davis. How cool is that? It's like me changing my name to Madonna or something. Not that I like Madonna, er whatever...shut up.
Grandma Bette still tries, most days, to put in a good effort to pretend like she's hearing everything that's going on and enjoying herself. She's sharp as a tack but can't hear worth a shit. But honestly, how much fun can it be for her to sit around watching all of us laugh and talk when she can't hear anything we say? I really do feel for her. She's got those patented responses down when someone asks her a question she can't hear. These include "Oh, uh huh." and "Oh isn't that nice." and "Oh sure, yeah. Just great." Now these responses usually can be applied to most topics of conversations so she pulls it off well, it just gets a little tricky when you ask her something that needs an actual answer.
Me: "So grandma, when was the last time you made your famous garlic popcorn?"
Grandma: "Oh, sure. Yes, terrific."
I know the cone of silence has got to be terrible isolating for her. I mean, she used to be able to hear me ok but now it seems I can only get through when I'm practically screaming at her and something about that just feels wrong. I find the easiest form of communication with her, when I'm not sitting right next to her that is, is email. That way I can get my point across without being misunderstood and she can hear what I'm saying clearly and not have to just say, "Oh yes isn't that great." She's pretty proficient at email, much better than she used to be anyway. Her first emails were blank without a title, I'd click to open it and there'd be nothing there. I'd have to scroll down for about a minute and there'd be her message, all the way at the bottom. I still can't figure out how she did this but hey, at least she was trying, but nowadays she's got it down pat. We email quite regularly and I find it's a great way to get to know my grandma. Easy to forget she was once a young woman like myself with stories and romances and great tales to tell.
Grandma used to have this hearing aid (she's tried them all) that had a little remote control that she'd keep in her pocket. When the volume of talking and laughter in the room got too much for her she'd just reach into her pocket and "boop" just shut that sucker off. It was pretty funny actually, there was no effort to hide it, she was like, "Yeah, can't hear a thing, I'm outta here. Boop."
Well, despite the hearing obstacles she's still an awesome lady and we did manage to have some good conversations. At one point during the visit she brought Henry something called a "penny whistle" which, as you can probably gather from the name, is a whistle you used to be able to buy for a penny. It actually looks more like a flute than a whistle and, according to grandma, is something that used to be quite popular in her day. She got nostalgic and a little teary (she always gets teary when she talks about anything having to do with the past.) telling me how they used to play the penny whistle on the ferry rides across the bay when she was a kid. Then she said something I loved and am still thinking about. She got very serious and said sadly, "Kristin, nobody whistles anymore. It's a shame, really. Everyone today is just too darn busy to whistle."
It got me thinking, is this true? Maybe, I don't know, I wasn't alive in the 30's did everyone go around whistling the day away? Man I hope so, that sounds cool! I think I still hear people whistling once and awhile but now that I really think about it I'm not so sure. I'll have to pay better attention. Luckily I still whistle (which she was delighted to hear) and I, in fact, have started teaching Henry to whistle too (no sound comes out when he does it but he loves practicing.)
Well after the week of visiting, yelling at my grandma and wearing parkas to keep dry was over, we had to head home. Sad to say goodbye (especially to my grandma and my 88 year old great aunt since I don't know when I'll see them again) but I must admit I was looking forward to going back to the warm weather and normal routine. When we're there for such a short time we're busy the entire time. So many relatives to visit, it's fun but exhausting. You need a vacation when you come home from your vacation.
So after packing up (in the rain) and leaving Seattle we drove to just the outside of Portland and spent the first night with my old pal Kriste in Oregon. This is my friend from elementary school but she left after 6th grade and I got reconnected with her via Facebook (she, Janel and I used to pal around and trade stickers). Kriste is radness in a bottle but she lives far away so I don't get to see her too often. She's the kind of friend you have that after you spend thirty minutes with her you already have inside jokes and weird nicknames.
Originally we were just going to stop by for a quick lunch on our way back to California but at the last minute we decided, screw it, we'll stay the night. I mean, how often do you get to spend the evening with radness in a bottle? Not often enough I tell you what.
So we pulled off the 5 and spent the evening in Corvallis, OR.
ORwhat?
Man, I love that joke.
We had dinner with Kriste and her mom, then the moms and Henry left to go drink chardonnay somewhere (hopefully just the moms did that) and Kriste and I began our Tour de Bars, where we hit two of the sweetest dive bars I've ever been to: The Peacock where she drank whiskey sours (because she said she wants to be a chick that drinks whiskey) and I drank their finest house red because I'm a connoisseur like that.
After the Peacock we then headed out to the next and last bar of the night which was attached to the restaurant "China Delight", which, conveniently happened to be located in the parking lot of my hotel. Lots of fun to catch up with my old pal, again, why do all these cool people I know live so damn far away. They should all pack up and move to Georgia with me....hey, it could happen.
The next morning we got up, packed our stinking crap (no seriously it smelled, we hadn't done laundry in a few days) and headed on down the road. Made it to Northern California that night, watched tv and fell asleep early. Mom got the cold Henry acquired in Seattle and so she was sawing major logs that night, I kept throwing socks and various things at her to get her to stop but alas to no avail. I had to try to sleep with all that racket. Now I know how my husband feels......not that he's sleeping with my mother, but because I apparently snore (who could believe that? A dainty little thing like me? Preposterous.)
After a very unrestful night we awoke and got ready for the drive home. Since we'd planned the trip out so well it looked like we were going to be back at mom's house in LA early that day, giving us time to relax for a bit before Henry and I headed back to San Diego that evening. Easy peasy.
Having you ever been driving along the 5 freeway between San Francisco and LA where it's nothing but farmland and tumble weeds and wondered to yourself, "I wonder what it would be like to breakdown all the way out here?"
Well, wonder no more! Yeah, breakdown, in the middle of fucking no where. I haven't had that much fun since, well, never. It sucked.
Thankfully the car was driveable but just barely. The cooling pump was busting so the car would overheat every ten minutes forcing us to pull over, shut off the engine, let it sit and then start it up again and drive for ten more minutes before it happened again. We got out our handy maps (because neither my mom nor I have smart phones) and located the nearest town that we were hoping might have a car garage with a diagnostic machine. I mean we could have called AAA but it probably would have taken them two hours to get to us (if they could even find us - "Yeah, AAA, we're out here, by that big stretch of dirt.") easier for us to drive ourselves even though it took a long time.
That ordeal was a pain in the ass but I learned something from it. CHIVALRY IS FUCKING DEAD. Not even necessarily chivalry, just some damn human compassion for crying out loud. Here are mom and I, stranded on the side of the road in the heat of the day in the middle of fucking no where and these big trucks and various cars were just veering around us as we sat at the side of the road waiting for the car to start again...and nary a one stopped to see if we were ok. Sure maybe we weren't waving our hands for help but still, no one even slowed down. Not that we needed rescuing but still, it would have been NICE to know SOMEONE gave a crap and maybe stopped to ask if we needed anything. Chivalry, along with whistling and compassion, is dead. We are doomed.
Anyway, to make a long story even longer, we finally made it into Fresno, found a Ford dealer, got the part we needed, and five hours later we were on our way. Makes for an exhausting day. We didn't get home until late that night so my and Henry's return to San Diego that night was sabotaged, I was just too damn tired to even think about it, but I had to get him back to school the next day. But I told myself I didn't want to think about that then, I'd think about that tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day.....
Well, tomorrow arrived and Henry and I were on the road by 6:45am. He in his pajamas clutching his beloved stuffed rhino (his bff since infancy, I shudder to think what might happen should we ever lose him.) and me in my old smelly clothes pouring coffee down my eye sockets trying to get this kid to school by 8am. Yeah, didn't make that goal but managed to get him dressed in his seat at school by 9:30am. Ahhhhh. Home. So nice to be back. I managed to unload the car and, although I had great plans to put everything away in it's proper place, the lure of the couch and my week load of shows on my dvr was just too promising. The couch won out. It was heaven.
Alas was short lived, before I knew it, the phone was ringing, mail was being delivered and my plants outside were screaming for watering. It was then time to pick up the kid and take him to a doctor appointment, then gymnastics, then the grocery store for food......and so on and so on and so on. Back to reality.
I need a vacation, or at least a solid 8 hours alone with my dvr......
