Don't pee in my bed! That's your what???

Oliver insisted on sleeping in a swim diaper last night, and I wondered if it would hold. At 6:10 this morning, he moved into bed with us, snuggled a bit and then said, "Mommy, what is this?" He patted the bed, and I said, "Oliver are you joking? It's the bed." "No, Mommy, this." I should have paid more attention to the mischievous smile curling the corners of his mouth.

Yep, you see where I'm headed: two large circles of tee-tee had migrated from his sopping diaper into our sheets and mattress (naturally this also means I'll be changing his bed today, in addition to mine; and a +2 for the to-do list).

"Oliver, it just stinks. Yuk."

"I think it smells awesome, like burned up hotdogs with ketchup on them."

All I could do was laugh, a sincere chortle tinged with a slight bit of resignation. Jack joined us in bed, mayhem ensued, Oliver unearthed a plastic bag of golf tees and balls from under our bed, tore the bag into small pieces which he tossed over us like faux snow, and all our pillows and sheets ended up on the floor. After an hour of increasing lunacy, T locked the boys out of the room at which point they started picking the lock with about 87 tees. We gave up, went downstairs and made a beeline to the coffee maker.

At this point, you might think, surely these parents will get a reprieve. Not so fast! On our counter I spied a Safety First rectal thermometer; you know, one of those made for babies. A vague sense of alarm entered my psyche as I asked someone to tell me why it was so casually in our kitchen.

Oliver: "Oh, that's my blaster!!"

Tom: "He's been playing with it for days."

Me: "Uh, that's been in his butt! Jack's too!"

Tom: "Oh, right!"

Oliver: "Hahahahahahahaha, I love my blaster, has it really been in my butt? Jack, it's been in my butt. It's been in your butt too!!! Hahahahaha."

Happy Monday all.

Re-entry

Last night, after leaving BlogHer '13, I headed back to DD and D's house for a quiet evening with them. Donna, author of the wonderful books, Landscape and Waiting for Bones (you should definitely buy and read both!!), had prepped all the fixings for Salads Niçoise, and Dirk, rabbit catcher, antique map seller, and many more (all very interesting), had ready two lovely bottles of wine. We had a spontaneous plating contest, and Donna won handily. It was all so very lovely; a leisurely night of thoughtful, good conversation with old friends just can't be beat.

Fast forward through the flight home today, and I was greeted at the airport by my sweet husband, eager and darling Jack, and a sleeping Ol. The boys had picked a huge bowl of tomatoes from our deck-based plants and what they didn't eat, they brought to me in this bowl. In addition to the attached note, I received three others plus a chopstick wand. Apparently, Oliver is now Hermione Granger, Jack is Harry Potter, and I am a sidekick. I love that Oliver only chooses to "be" and love women who are smart and strong. Hermione is an excellent addition to the Wonder Woman/Padmé Amidala/Princess Leia train.

The change in pace was expected but nonetheless a tad jarring. Man, do those little boys remind me of the Looney Toons Tasmanian Devil. There was nakedness, jumping, spell after spell, turning the easel into a three-dimensional robot, eating, more eating, spilling, attempts to core apples with large knives, and unceasing talking. We went to the market, finished the wine country puzzle, ate two dinners...And then I spied this:

"Boys, what is in Percy's crate?"

"Toilet paper, Mom, lots of it."

In an rabid desire to free the cardboard tubes from inside many rolls of toilet paper, they had unrolled the paper, shoved it (plus, apparently a number of other random objects like a Ziploc of corks, some discarded works of art) all into Percy's crate and then Duck-taped the rolls into "label makers." Don't ask, I don't know. Just after this episode, Tom asked for some toilet paper and, wait for it, there was no more in the house. Add that to the "I'm glad I wasn't here" list.

They are so precious though, and I loved snuggling with each, hearing their little voices, laughing at all their silliness. It was so incredibly good to get away, spend days straight with adults, operate on my own schedule, have uninterrupted time to consider what I'm doing and where I want to head. But it was also good to get home to my war-zone of a house, markers littering the floors, and more pieces of paper than you could possibly imagine with the word "butt" written on them.

Tom grilled salmon while I made our sides: tomatoes with young chevre and super-aged Balsamic; kale with cannellini, onion, herbs and shaved parmesan a la Deborah Madison. We sat on the deck enjoying a lovely night, and I started to settle back in.

Observations from Terminal B and row 14

As you might know, I love to observe the people and happenings around me, wherever I may be. Restaurant bars, playground benches, subways and airports provide especially ripe environments for my ethnographic study. O'Hare's Terminal B, and my cozy row on the aircraft have been bonanzas this morning.

As the snaky security line wriggled slowly towards the final checkpoint, I spied a woman decked out in workout gear from head to knee. Curiously, south of her patellae her style veered sharply right of fancy with jeweled sandals adorning her feet. I don't get it at all. Flip-flops with shorts of most any kind, yes! But reversing that equation doesn't work.

Another glaring choice was the pair of shockingly tight, stretchy white athletic shorts ahead of me as we boarded. Really, they resembled a 1-ply Kleenex, and the view was TMI.

At my two-o'clock stood a failed comb-over. Oh dear. A shock of frizzy curls had escaped its gluey scalp latch, flipped over the forced part and swayed; it was the hair equivalent of a dangling participle.

Once aboard, the input kept coming! To my immediate right was a pasty man, all peach-fuzz facial hair and random arm tatts. This was no problem, and in fact I only noticed these details because he was besieged -and thusly so was I- by the most irritating sniffle-tic ever. His sniffles and attendant throat-clearings were as constant and staccato as a woodpecker's efforts on a big tough tree.

On my left was a kindly man whose heft moved into one-third of my middle-seat space. His wife passed him a granola bar, and he placed the top eighth into his mouth as if it were a fax awaiting the instruction to begin moving through the scanner. He managed to eat this bar, hands-free!, utilizing a combination chew-swallow-reel in technique. To his credit, he didn't seem to lose much in the process. As his right arm hovered over my lap, I think I'd have noticed stray crumbs.

Ultimately, I moved to an empty middle seat across the aisle because Sniffle-tic was making me nervous: any sort of sickness relapse is NOT what I need.