Bad Weather, Bad Omen, Bad Attitude

This weather is KILLING me.

Last night I checked my handy dandy weather app to see what the weather was going to be like for Connor's game the following day.  This is what I saw...

hmmmmmmm.  That can't be good.   

A severe weather warning.

Don't you love reading the words "below normal", "snow levels", and "freezing temperatures" in LATE MAY?  If I had a therapist, I would have added him to my speed dial.

I snapped.  I had reached my foul weather limit.  If there was an app that could have warned the surrounding areas of my impending bad attitude, it would have immediately issued a severe ATTITUDE warning to anyone who had the misfortune to cross my path.  This would have been its prediction:

"Irritated grouchy-ness will continue through the week.  Cussing and muttering are expected.  Isolated tantrums and widespread gloom are possible until weather improves."

Needless to say I went to bed very grouchy.  And when I woke up this morning, I spent a good part of the day checking and then re-checking the forecast as if the weather people would make a sudden and less gloomy prediction from the one posted ten minutes before.

But  the sad reality was RAIN, RAIN, and more RAIN...

When I arrived for the game the sky looked like this...

How nice.  The gray complimented my dreary overcast eyes and furrowed brows.

This photo was taken during the best weather of the evening.  The worst was yet to come, and naturally, we were about to survive the impending doom while we were visiting the town of Phoenix/Talent-which isn't quite as posh as sitting under the slightly sheltered bleachers back in Ashland. 

Do you notice a massive lack of fans in the above photo?  The frigid winds had long blown most of the timid parents away to the shelter of their cars.  Just the die-hards left.  But even I was questioning my sanity.  And see my friend to the right?  That's Nicolle.  She appears to be wearing a Snuggie but it's actually what I call a Snuggie on steroids.  Water-proof on the outside, soft and fuzzy on the inside.  It's made for Grizzly football fans.  But I think Nicolle has used it way more for the spring baseball than she does for football season.

Then suddenly things took a bizarre turn for the worse.  When we headed into the top of the 6th inning, I looked up at the scoreboard and saw this:

It seems the Heavens come pre-wired with an emergency sprinkler system set to douse and put out any spark of demonic omens.  As the center lights for the inning changed from the 5th to the 6th, the skies opened and let out a torrential downpour.

The deluge was massive.  So massive that I broke from my usual disdain for that awkward contraption the umbrella.   Most Oregonians find the umbrella more of a bother than a protective haven.  We prefer to rush through the rain unencumbered.  But sitting in and soaking up the rain while sitting on metal bleachers is another matter altogether.

The rain poured so hard my large umbrella could have used a gutter on its circumference and a massive downspout to siphon the rain away.  Instead, every body part unfortunate enough to be under the trailing edges of the umbrella got a thorough soaking.  We tried to get someone to take a photo of our sad little scene but no one was brave enough to stand in the rain long enough to take one.

So there Nicole and I sat; top of the 6th, wind whipped, soaked by rain, left to contemplate the meaning of the unpleasant omen belching from the scoreboard.

Something drastic had to be done.  And so we did it.

Yes, sadly, we began to cheer for the opposing team.  If the score remained tied it would mean playing another inning-which in our desperate and depressed state, could not, should not, happen.  Not to mention, if they called the game due to rain we'd have all went home knowing we'd left the score at the unmentionable.  And any Ashlander knows that would be very bad Karma.

The pitcher on the opposing team was a bit surprised as we began to cheer him on by name.  Our sons looked at us in shock and disbelief.  Their own mothers rooting on the enemy.  But we were drenched, tired, wind whipped mothers and I'd like to think that the...

...scoreboard beguiled us.

And it worked.  We lost!  But did we really?

No.  It meant I got to go home!

Top of the 8th, I'm soaking my weather woes in the tub.  Sounds like a small victory to me.

More Love Notes

More bedtime love notes have piled up on my night stand.

While Connor's have remained sincere, Chloe's notes have become lukewarm betrothals of randomness.

Here's the latest sampling of Connor's love notes:

 Connor could eat cereal 24/7,

so this one's a declaration of absolute love...

He also LOVES baseball,

so this is also very sincere...

Then the next one...I wasn't even sure what it meant. 

Finally, I guessed it had to have something to do

with baseball.  So I Googled baseball and #55.

Turns out it's Tim Lincecum's number.

which means this love profession is the REAL deal:

This next one...it's a toss up.

He loves scuba diving but hates cleaning his room...

Next, love and random-ness collide.

Then, one glorious night

when Mark was out of town...

Connor slipped me this beauty:

We both knew he was exaggerating

but I let the kid stay up an extra hour

just for trying.

Then there's Chloe's notes:

If you ask me, she's been making some 

meager love comparisons lately.

Then some nights,

there's no admission of love whatsoever:

Then there's the "suggestion box" love note:

That note came from a kid who gets a nice
homemade lunch every single day.
The one time I take the day off...I get a scolding!

And occasionally, blissfully,
Chloe hands in a real love note...

...an Oreo Blizzard?  That my friends, is LOVE!

You can read the history of the Love Notes and how it all began by clicking here.

Creature Comforts

Chaperoning an overnight field trip comes with serious occupational hazards.  Perhaps this is why this sort of extravaganza is operated on a volunteer basis.  And perhaps also why the school does an extensive background check on every volunteer's criminal and driving records.  Because wrangling children who you cannot threaten to beat, is a serious challenge.   And those with parole officers will not get through these sort of challenges smoothly.

That's why Mark was a shoe-in for Chloe's most recent school field trip.  His record is squeaky clean and he is far more patient than I.  In my own personal opinion, I believe it's his old age that makes him so docile around the little people.  (Once you perch old man glasses on the tip of your nose, you risk being stereotyped by your wife-on her blog, for the rest of your life.)

Which is also why, when Mark told me his plan to bring along the Aero-Bed on the kid's "Zoo Snooze" field trip,  I mocked his embarrassing plan.

"That's a dead give-away that you're getting old." I told him.  Then I pointed out how bulky and heavy smuggling in such contraband would be.  And how lame he would look sprawled out  comfortably on the floor of the Portland Zoo's classroom while the rest of the boys huddled uncomfortably on thin sleeping pads in what little space would remain of the floor.  "Tough it out old man!  It's only for ONE night!" I chided.

Well, I thought my little diatribe settled things.  But today during Connor's baseball game, a few of the "Grandstand Moms" who went on the field trip enlightened me on the subject.

Apparently he startled many of the kids and chaperons when he fumbled into the boys classroom and parted the sea of boys with his queen-sized mattress.  Boys had to scamper and flee from the gigantic mattress as Mark plugged it in and let the motor blow.  The poor boys took their thin little sleeping pads and bags and groveled for what little space remained.  I can just imagine the scene:  a refugee camp of displaced boys with Mark snuggled up all cozy and carefree on his posh queen mattress, right in the center of it all.  AWKWARD!

Naturally Mark did not take any photos of this sad little scene.  I guess he didn't want me to get wind that he went ahead with his devious scheme despite my pleadings.  Nor blog it I suppose.  But that's what's so great about the unauthorized part of this blog confessional.  And what he didn't count on was a few of my blog readers/spies who can spot a post in the making and filled me in on his every-man-for-himself plot!  Next time ladies, get some pictures!!

Word spread quickly there a queen size bed had been smuggled in.  I'm not sure if the other chaperons were shocked or impressed by the rumor, though Mark swears it's the latter.  And he thinks he's started a new trend of opulence for overnight chaperoning.  He says a new standard has been set, the bar has been raised,  the bed has been inflated! 

And if everyone follows suit next year, where will the kids sleep?  Perhaps there's room in the tiger sanctuary.

Here's a few pics Chloe took at Zoo Snooze:

Whoa!  Look at all those kids! 

There's something to be said for having 

a sketchy background check. 

Hope the kids liked this sanctuary...

They may be sleeping in there next year if 

all the chaperons bring Aero-Beds.

Uh...look closely at this next one.  
I would have asked for my money back 

after visiting this "habitat"...

Apparently Chloe was alarmed at the Poser Penguins too...

Does this classroom look big enough for 30 boys
AND a queen-sized Aero-Bed??

This subject was apparently a little too tall for such a short photographer...

So while the kids studied the habitats of all the zoo creatures, we too learn one very important lesson:  The habitat of a contented over 40 dad on an overnight field trip must include lots of creature comforts!

Re-Thinking the Easter Bunny

Okay, okay,  I know Easter is long gone and nobody's thinking about it anymore.  Everyone's focused on Mother's Day, Father's Day, perhaps even Fourth of July or graduation celebrations.  But not here at the Skillman house.  We're still stuck on Easter because the consequences of one little misguided decision is still rearing it's ugly head around here.


This year "The Easter Bunny" adopted what was thought to be a very clever idea.  What it turned out to be was a very very foolish notion.  We decided The Bunny decided to enact a scheme to give out less candy by filling the eggs with pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, a few $1 and $5 bills, and A NEW and VERY MISGUIDED IDEA...some coupons.

It all worked out brilliantly at first.  No sugar highs, no candy wrappers strewn about, or chocolate schmucked onto furniture.  A brilliant plan...until the coupons started getting turned back in!

I must confess it all seemed like a good idea since our kids usually forget about this kind of stuff.  I figured The bunny figured the kids would lose them all in no time and never actually hand the coupons back in.  Sneeky I know.  It's kinda like those big companies that hand out all those rebates knowing most people are going to forget to mail it back on time or betting that they'll lose their original receipt.

Well, that devious plan backfired (as most of my devious plans do).  All was quiet for several weeks.  In fact, I had completely forgotten all about the coupons...until things suddenly took a turn for the worse over the course of a single tragic day:

When Chloe came home from school, I casually asked her to unload the dishwasher.  She handed me this:

l

So, while I unloaded the dishwasher all by myself,  I asked Connor to head up to his trashed bedroom and do a little picking up.  To which he responded by handing me this...

Those underhanded little demons did not stop there!  Nooooooo.

Once a week a strange phenomenon happens in which Connor and Chloe begin to get so giggly and silly that they turn into strange imps and get into all kinds of mischief.  Naturally, it happened on this day.  Things quickly unraveled when they started provoking the cat with one of those laser pointers-which sends Edward Scissorhands into an erratic scamper around the house and furniture.  Finally when I couldn't take the "lets freak out the cat" game any longer, I beg them to stop and threaten to send them outside.  That's when they handed me this...in conjunction with this...(double coupons!!)

So now they're out of trouble and I'm upstairs in a very messy/stinky boy's room for the next 20 minutes playing some sort of homemade board game with these two demonized rascals who decided to share coupons!

That 20 minutes was a trial on my patience!   Playing a homemade game for 20 minutes strait with giggly children who knew they were pulling one over on me took some serious effort on my part!  When I had served my prescribed time I immediately got up and headed out of the room.

No sooner had I reached the threshold I was handed this:

Just great.

Operation "Infuriate Mother" was now almost complete.  I was now plotting to hide empty eggs next year full of absolutely nothing!  As I contemplated cruel Easter Bunny tricks for next year, I spent the next half hour reading in the middle of the day to two squirmy kids who knew they had gotten the best of their mother.

When my time was up, yet again, I attempted my getaway.  But not before another coupon:

Luckily for me, when a nine year old requests dinner it's usually for things like mac and cheese or nachos!  So I got through this coupon much easier.  Unfortunately, that meant the rest of us would be insulting our palettes by eating kid food.

At last dinner was over which meant I would soon be starting the bedtime routine!  Whew!  I couldn't wait to end this day.  I was already plotting to "misplace" the rest of their coupons the following day when the kids were at school!

At last the day was done and I could send the scoundrels to bed and close this awful chapter on lessons learned.

But, no, I had not seen the last of the dreaded coupon nightmare!  These two had one more coupon to bestow...

Coupons Schmoopons!  Let their teeth rot next year.