Wednesday, May 17, 2006

A Fine Mother's Day, Indeed

I wanted to write a post about my Mother's Day weekend that spoke of how I had to sleep in the woods, cook breakfast for everyone, take down and pack half our campsite and then endure the shaming by Andy and Kevin when they tried to drive away from the campground without me.



But I can't do it funny-like, so I just won't do it. All of the above did happen, although out of context it sounds worse than it was - well, most of it.



Andy had the great idea of going camping for Mother's Day weekend. We went to Susquehanna State Park which is close to my parents' house and it is also the famed FIRST PLACE I EVER IN MY LIFE CAMPED in 1997 with Andy. This time we chose a campsite only 2 sites away from the FIRST PLACE I EVER IN MY LIFE CAMPED and it brought back some memories.



Can I take a moment to relive the most memorable memory? (is that redundant?)
When we arrived, we needed to buy ice or bait or both, I can't remember, so we had to leave the park and find our way into town, which I think Andy expected to be easier for me to do than it was. I mean, my parents live close to the park but not that close, so I spent my Friday nights cruising the town in my parents' Mercury Grand Marquis 2 towns over, not the town by the park. As we crested a hill about to see the Promised Land that was 7-Eleven, the setting sun shone directly into my eyes and - BAM! - I got a migraine. "Andy, while you're in the store, can you get me a soda? I need to take some medicine."



We returned to the park, set up our campsite and prepared to have a lovely dinner of hot dogs and baked beans (which, by the way, is still our camping food of choice.) Out came the stove and the pan and the can of beans but - oops - we had no can opener. Andy carried a small sort of can opener thing in his pocket most of the time so he decided to use that. No luck, still stuck (got kids? you'll get that reference.) What was it, a good 20 minutes of Andy fighting with that thing and getting seriously perturbed before he gave up? Knowing him as I do now, I'm surprised he didn't spend another hour on it and then just slam the can of beans on the ground until it threw itself open in fear. I think he was trying to impress me so although he was angry and wouldn't listen to my suggestion of how to use his "can opener" to open the can, he didn't slam anything (well, maybe the tailgate.) After he was done, I gingerly approached the can with Andy's "can opener" and performed the surgery I had suggested and voila! We ate beans with our hot dogs that evening, thank you very much.



We've been on lots of camping trips since then but never again have we forgotten to bring a can opener.



Now, back to Mothers Day, 2006... we got to the park later than we planned on Friday evening and Kevin had fallen asleep in the car on the way which pretty much meant that he'd either 1) wake up when we got there and remain awake for 2 extra hours past his bedtime or, 2) stay asleep all evening and wake up at 5:00 am and poke our eyes to wake us up because, "It's time to go fishing!" Don't think I'm not speaking from experience.



He slept through us setting up the tent and bedding and unloading a few things and it was really cool to be back in action with just Andy setting everything up like the dandy team that we are (get it?) without even having to speak. And it was so quick and efficient! Quite unlike the last time we camped when Kevin "helped" with everything.



I'll make this story short at this point but remind me to tell you later about the time mixup with my parents on Saturday. That was a hoot. But anyway, we had a terrific weekend and I got a present besides camping... a Trek bike catalog with a post-it note inside saying, "Happy Mother's Day" on the page of hybrids because I'd mentioned to Andy that I thought it would be easier to ride to the store on my bike if I didn't have to use my current road bike (for various reasons I won't bore you with here.) Yahoo! Now I get to go test ride some bikes at the shop.



Oh, and I almost finished reading The Da Vinci Code this weekend because I had so much "free" time while Andy took care of most things and I was able to finish it on Monday. Quick review: I really enjoyed it.



I hope you all had a nice Mother's Day weekend as well.

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