Suburbia Absurdia

Ok. I'm going to bore the living crap out of you. But it's my blog and I can blog any frickin' way I want to. Nyah.

I'm going to tell you about each day of my festive 4th of July weekend, warts and all. No wasting time with beheadings or stage-managed statue toppling or the wit and wisdom of Big Dick - that stuff is so, well, last Wednesday.

This is about me.

So. Saturday. I woke up earlier than I usually do on weekend mornings. No particular reason; just conditioning from the workweek, methinks. 7AM. Didn't even feel like making a fresh pot of coffee, so just nuked yesterday's leftovers. Yum. Don't tell me you don't do that every so often.

Puttered around the house a bit, since Missus C and I had an appointment at 10AM to sign the papers on a new car for her (well, not new, but...). Shameless Digression: She's been coveting a red VW Beetle since the new style Beetles hit the market 5 or 6 years back. This past Wednesday, she saw a red Beetle on a local car lot, and casually mentioned it to me that evening. Thursday night I stopped on the way home, and picked it up. Red 1999 Turbo Beetle with 12,500 miles on it. Yes, you read that mileage report right. I didn't believe it either, so had to plunk down the money for a carfax.com report - and it's true mileage. Anyway, I park the car in front of my house, come rushing in the front door, she's in the kitchen and says to me, "why didn't you shut the front door?". "Gotta go," says I, feigning pain, running for the bathroom, "and will you get the front door for me, please?"

Grumble grumble, says she.

15 seconds later, I hear a delighted scream from the entry way of our house. Yep, sometimes it's great being a great guy.

After signing the papers today, I come home to work on the pool filter. Our pool is a mess, because the filter's been up and down all year, but I think I've about got it licked. Spent an hour pulling it apart and hosing off the plates inside, then go to fill it and charge it back up (don't worry if you don't know what I'm talking about, just follow along here). Before pulling it apart, I shut all the valves. When I went to refill and turn it back on, I opened all of the valves except one - the inlet to the filter. I turn the filter pump on. Water everywhere - I overpressurized the strainer, and blew out a previous epoxy repair on the strainer because I forgot to open the damn inlet valve. Damn. I'm back to square one. Filter's still not working. Pool's still a mess. So am I. (You think working on a pool is a clean job? Ha!)

Shower. Load the crew in the 'new' Beetle. Drive to Home Depot to get some epoxy to re-repair the previous repair on the repaired filter strainer. Then Missus C wants to "run into Macy's for just a minute". To the mall we go. Then daughter wants to go to Borders. To Borders we go. By this time, we're all hungry, and I'll be damned if I'm going home just to fire up the grill tonight. To Applebee's we go (industrial sludge with watered down frozen strawberry daquaris. But by this time on a hot day, I needed something frozen, anything.)

Finally get home. Mix epoxy. Re-seal the strainer repair. We'll see if it holds. I think I'll let it cure until the morning just to make sure. I hear a commotion next door, and look over the fence. There are four kids on the pitched roof of a small, single story empty house next to mine playing "Marco Polo" with a basketball. I'm serious. They're calling "Marco! Polo! Marco! Polo!" and throwing the ball at each other. I guess the idea is to knock one of your buddies off the roof before they knock you off. Considered calling the cops, but then reconsidered as the kids were obviously exploring one of the precepts of Darwinism. Perhaps a summer assignment from school, I don't know. Didn't want to interrupt if this was indeed the case.

Noticed my daylillies really need to be split. Mental note for tomorrow.

Sun's now going down, and just got back from a walk to the river. Missus C and I had fished a baby goose out of the pool earlier in the week, and released it with the geese flock that normally hangs out at the river. Went looking for it...no signs. Will update you on baby goose status as conditions and sightings warrant.

So, how was your day?

Tommorow - grilled meat, Pat Benatar, and controlled explosions (and hopefully, a working pool filter...). And by this time, I'll bet you're just wetting your knickers waiting for the report!

Patience...