Dawn broke early over the HQ; Jr. and therefore Daddy rose early. We watched ESPN while we waited on the couch for Mommy to wake up; eventually we ventured back into the bedroom to “help” her get up. Helping someone wake up is one of Jr’s many, many talents. It worked. Once the three of us were up, dressed, fed, and freshly diapered (just one of us on that last point. OK, maybe two), Kjel.org then had a confab to figure out what we should do today. Nobody really had any plans, the weather was nice: the day was pregnant with possibility. Stinkboy lobbied hard for the park; Daddy wanted some shopping time at Costco. Turns out we got both; no pictures at Costco though. Below are Mommy and Monkey-boy climbing a slide. The boy doesn’t need any help to climb that ladder, but Mommy was worried because it was a bit slippery. Daddy knew that the lad would be fine.

The lad is now so big that he isn’t content just to swing on the swings himself, oh no. Here he is pushing Mommy on a swing. Jr. has learned the hard way some valuable lessons about practical physics by pushing the CFO on swings. For example, he now knows that if he remembers to get the heck out of the way when the swing starts moving back toward him, pushing Mommy (or anyone, really) is that much more fun.

Today was a little less fun. The lad and Daddy were up early again, but now it was cold and cloudy. We went outside and raked leaves and cleaned gutters, my way of battening down the hatches at the HQ in preparation of the inbound hurricane. A certain boy got absolutely filthy outside but balked at coming inside for a bath; eventually, he relented and got cleaned up. Stinkboy got pretty dirty too.

After our outdoor work was done the CEO decided he wanted a McRib, so an errand at the hardware store was invented. (”I’m going to get some more, uh, leaf bags, yeah, we definitely need more leaf bags. I’ll be back soon . . .”) I went to the store, and on my way home tried to stop for my McRib. I got my sandwich, but with no help from the local cops: an hour or two earlier they had shot some guy at the hotel next door to McD’s, and had the entire McD parking lot blocked off with yellow tape. Luckily, there was a friendly McD employee out in the street directing folks on how to get through the drive through: turns out the cops had left a path open for cars, but it was not at all apparent if you weren’t told about it. First you kill some guy under weird circumstances, then you compound the situation by attempting to deny the CEO his constitutionally protected right to freely associate with a McRib. Banner day for the local police. I want both of these injustices fully investigated.

Lunch though was tasty after all that . . .