Wednesday, June 13, 2012

I love planes

I spent the weekend in Denver. It was, of course, fantastic.

My sister and I went to the zoo with the kids on Friday. I always love the zoo in theory, but then hate it when I get there and realize I have to deal with other people. Also, other people's children. People who wander around aimlessly in traffic like sun-poisoned camels. I am sure I am guilty of this myself at times, so I haven't yet stabbed anyone, but I've come close.

There's a little play area with a creek for the kids to splash in at this zoo. It's a neat idea. I hung out there for a while with my sister's kids. When I first got there, I sat down on the edge of one end with my niece and quickly realized I'd intruded on a mommies group of some kind. This isn't a bad thing all by itself. Most of my favorite people are moms.

But these were... well, I kept getting looks like, "Are you one of us? No, you couldn't possibly. You don't have that organic raw vegan healthy glow about you. And that child with you has a smudge on her dress. Hmm. Maybe you're someone's cousin." This was mildly amusing to me, but it got really hilarious when they started talking about their children and preschools and wait lists. At first I thought they meant the children who were with them, the tiny toddlers splashing at their feet.

And then I realized that all these women were pregnant--some not even showing yet--, and they were talking about their unborn children. I almost had a brain aneurysm. Is this a thing? I mean, is there a preschool that is actually so FANTASTIC that you need to wait-list your -7 month old? Really?

I also got to watch my sister kick some butt on the Tough Mudder in Beaver Creek. It was almost a half marathon up and down a mountain (twice), with obstacles. Some were easy, or so says my sister, who is a machine. And some were hard. Like a vat of ice that you had to dive into and then under a wall, and then haul your frozen rear back out by the power of your arms and the adrenaline induced by the fear of dying in a vat of ice.

It was not a spectator-friendly event. I only got to watch about five of the 25-odd obstacles. This mostly involved taking a ski lift up to the top of a mountain, waiting in line for a beer, and then running up and down half the mountain in a panic several times wondering if I'd missed her going by. I hadn't. It was just a lot longer of a course than it was supposed to be.

Did you know that using twice the amount of sunscreen you normally do is not enough if you're at twice the elevation you're used to? I did not. I also didn't think to wear a hat. I now appear to have mange and a dirty forehead. But really it's just seared flesh. Nothing catching. If I'm ever at 10,000 feet all day again, I will drape myself in muslin from head to toe.

I flew back home Monday afternoon. A lady came and sat down in the terminal across from me about an hour before boarding. She got out her laptop and headphones, which I thought meant quiet.

But no. She was Skyping. Loudly. About Gary, who just gives her so much b***s***, and she's so sick of it, and it's over between them. Why can't she find a guy who isn't so skittish or annoyed by her career? She needs to live, you know. And MOM. Oh my goodness, MOM is just being so awful about the whole thing. Mom wants her to quit her job and find something else so she can get a man, but she REALLY isn't looking for a man right now, you know? And so on. For an hour. Or so I presume. I moved after ten minutes, but she was still yakking away when boarding started. I felt sorry for her. What girl hasn't been there, right? But for a grown woman to be so unaware of her surroundings is baffling.

I arrived safe and sound (obviously), and all day for two days now, all I've heard is, "Mommy, I missed you!" and had tiny arms flung around my neck, leg, arm, and torso. I missed them, too. Like, really missed them, which I didn't even realize until Jeremy picked me up and I saw them in the back seat. I could have happily stayed longer, but it's good to be home.

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