Just Because

It is the end of a fun Saturday night. We went to a party on the beach this evening. We watched the sun go down, the dogs played, the kids played, the adults played, the baby cried some, the other kids cried some, there were s'mores and everyone was happy, happy, happy.

Now they are all asleep. And tomorrow there is football. Good football! Woohoo! And there might also be mountain bike riding! Double-de-woohoo!

Happy Beach Party Saturday Night to you.

Successful with a Side of How'd That Happen

Well, we survived the weekend which included one birthday party in Aromas and one double birthday party we put on for Grady and Sully at a park in Watsonville. Of course, the effort to attend a party is nothing close to the effort it takes to put one on so yesterday was by far the more tiring day of the weekend.

But the weather was fantastic, we had a great spot with a shaded spot with a bunch of picnic tables and a bounce house with a slide and not too many meltdowns or bashed bodies (which always amazes me when there is a bounce house involved).

The morning prep was interrupted by a not very fun trip to the emergency room as my wife, in the midst of making frosting for her fabulous gluten-free cupcakes, got her finger caught on the wrong end of a Braun stick blender. It gashed her finger up pretty good and I could tell that it really, really hurt like a mofo. But, a mere $220 later, no stitches as the damage was superficial and could be repaired by butterfly closures and a good wrap. Oh and some antibiotics and pain pills.

The party itself was a good time once we got everything sorted out and set up. I wish we'd known about the parking issues as there was a soccer game being played and literally every single parking spot was occupied, people were even double parking and blocking people in!

One annoying aspect of having the party in a park, especially one where there was an adult soccer game being played is that there are scads of bored kids looking for something to do. And that big puffy bounce house looks like something fun to do. I didn't really want to have the bouncer opened up to the entire group of kids at the park before our party started. Not only was there no supervision of them, there were a bunch of them, they were older and our kids aren't very big yet. But we consented to let them play around. Then they asked for a drink and then another wanted a drink. It becomes a very slippery slope.

You don't want to be a jerk and tell them to piss off but you also don't want them invading your party, eating and drinking all of your food and generally just adding to the chaos. Of course, there are no parents keeping an eye on their kids, they are on their own.

And two older brothers came over, asked to bounce, got permission, got inside and started getting wild almost immediately. I booted them out because I had no interest in one of them accidentally clocking my kids as they flipped around.

The food we'd gotten was outstanding. I mean, really, really friggin' excellent. We ordered the food from the same place that did our wedding a number of years ago and their food is every bit as awesome now as it was then. And I've been eating the leftovers all week and loving every bite. Seriously, if you're local and you want an awesome deal on an even more awesome meal then go hit up D'La Colmena on East Lake in Watsonville. They will do you up right!

It was fun but I'm glad its done though I am doubly or triply happy that our cousins were able to be here for the party. We don't get to see them enough but when we do, Grady and his cousin, Aiden, are like the absolute bestest of best friends ever. It is kind of pretty awesome.

It also makes me miss my own cousin, Davy (or Davis as he likes to be called now since we're in our 40's). We used to be the two peas in a pod pals but somewhere along the way, he went one way, I went the other and that's that. It isn't like there is any reason just that he lives in Vermont and I live in California and there's not a whole lot of contact. He's also got two wild boys of his own (and I think a third on the way) so his "free" time is pretty limited.

Anyway, we survived, everyone had fun and we're still working through all of the awesome gifts the boys received.

'Tis the Kid's Birthday Party Season

I think we've been to three kid's parties in the last three weekends. The one on Saturday was a good one even though our weekend weather lately has been less than stellar. It was a combined party for two kids, a boy and a girl. The boy was a classmate of Grady's from his pre-school so there were alot of his friends from there and that ensured him having a good time charging around and playing with them.

Sully has a slower entry speed to parties these days. He gets very shy and keeps his face buried in my shoulder. But, once he warms up, he's a little demon running around with a huge grin and playing soccer and pretending to be a monster and he's even gotten pretty adept at battling the pinata scrum to claim his share of fallen candy. He used to pick up one piece and then work on unwrapping it so he could eat it but now he groks the gather as much as possible mentality with the best of them.

There were two pinatas at this last party, one in blue for the birthday boy and one in pink for the birthday girl. I, for one, am astonished that there were no serious incidents with the whacking stick. The first pinata took many serious hits from the kids, some of whom bring an almost frightening amount of power to their swings. Yes, these are five year olds but damn, some are making very, very loud contact.

It was the back swings that scared me the most. As the pinatas started to break apart, a couple of pieces of candy would fall and several kids would try to rush the field and claim the candy while the child with the whacking stick would still be attempting to whack the pinata. There were some incredibly close calls including one where Grady missed getting smashed in the face by about two inches.

And, oddly enough, I was channel flipping last night and happened across America's Funniest Videos doing a segment on pinatas which had me laughing out loud. From the wild swings into the parent's balls to the baseball style annihilation that turned the pinata into a missile to the little piker's taking swings only to get decked by the pinata swinging back into them. It was awesome and really, really funny.

Still, these kid's parties end up being much, much longer than I ever anticipate (Saturday's was around 4 hours!) and there's always too much sugar for my liking but the boys have a good time and that's the important thing to me. And, oh yeah, the food was outstandingly awesome, a taco bar with all kinds of authentico fillings, fantastic salsa and guacamole and a really tasty chicken salad! That never hurts!

Also, no bounce house this time around which is fine. I'm consistently amazed that there aren't really serious injuries from kids playing in those things. They seem like a perfect storm of out of control physicality, different sized bodies and launchpad bouncability. Though they are a really good time to play in!

It Was Good Fun Until the Wiener Dog Bit Me

I'm finding that the more I refer to it as a wiener dog, the less annoyed I am about the whole thing. The cut to the chase is that we went to a birthday party and a wiener dog bit me, bit me good really. Got a good chunk taken out of my right hand near my thumb.

But up until that moment, we'd been having a good time at kid's birthday party up in the hills. The main attraction was an inflatable water slide that was usable by all but the smallest of the kids there.

And they used the heck out of it, it was complete pandemonium when it first went into use. Lots of fun and chaos and no smacked heads at all, which was astonishing to me and some of the other parents. But things settled down fairly quickly and really the slide kept a whole bunch of kids happily occupied for a good while.

When it came time to tear into the pinata (a rather large Hello Kitty model), there were just four kids left on the water slide, my two boys, an older girl and a same age as Sully boy. Despite repeated mentions of a pending candy storm, none of the kids were ready to stop sliding yet.

Grady ended up getting out just a minute or two before before the pinata was split open and the candy fell. His candy gathering game has improved markedly and he certainly got his share of sugary loot. Sully did not but there were enough adult allies to put together a bag for him too.

And yes, once the candy was rolling, the slide was forgotten.

It was during the candy munching period that the little dachshund wiener dog got very upset at being tied up and found a tasty hand to lash out on. And the only positive in it is that the dog bit me and not Sullivan who was sitting closer and had the advantage of being lightly coated in chocolate.

But I got to be the lucky one and get tagged. It isn't a deep bite but it is a pretty good one, leaving a decent flap of skin loose. It also put a pretty immediate damper on the party and made getting home a little bit of a challenge.

Now its a little more than a day later and it looks alot better than it did yesterday and no signs of infection though I did get permission to chop off the little dog's head if I needed to.

I don't think it'll come to that but I also don't think I'm going to be riding any bikes anytime soon.

Honored

As the end of the school year approaches at breakneck speed, there's a mixture of anticipation, fear, uncertainty and good ol' excitement at each of my schools. There are also alot of events to commemorate and mark the ending of this school year.

Today we had an event put on by the grateful and happy parents at one of my schools. They are grateful and happy because the school is one of the top elementary schools in the whole state. Which means that their kids are among the top students in the state. Oh yeah, it also means the property values in the surrounding area get a bump too.

But that really isn't why the event was put on as its been going for years and is a traditional way for the community to say thanks to all of the people who make the school run. From the teachers to the office staff to the yard duty supervisors to the teaching interns to the computer guy.

The theme was the far east and the decor was awesome, unique and really cool. I sat at the Koi Pond table which turned out to be a coincidental choice. But let me rewind for just a minute. Yesterday the boys got a close up look at a tabletop zen garden, the kind with a miniature rake, tiny little pagodas and wee boulders. And they loved it. They were both absolutely fascinated by it.

And the Koi Pond table's special little thank you was a mini-mini zen garden. Which made my day after already having an awesome meal (though the lack of sake with sushi is troubling, understandable since the lunch was at school but troubling nonetheless).

There's another school party coming up and then maybe one more party at my other school. Not sure about that one right now. But today's party was a really nice time made all the better by a neat little thank you gift.

Fly Butterfly

This was an unusually busy weekend for us with three parties in two days. One was an end of the school year faculty party held at one of the teacher's houses above Watsonville with a stellar view. One was a birthday party for a four year close to some other friend's with a great backyard. And the last was a bbq among our pals leading into drunken poker (which I didn't stay for).

We almost made it out of the party mode without any injuries but my two over-tired and crazy boys got into a game of chasing each other around the car's in the carport (after Grady had a night-ending accident but was in some clean undies again). Sully was in pursuit and either dragged his foot or just tripped over it. Either way, the end result was a bloodied up toe and screaming loud enough to wake the recently deceased. Which gave way to passing out as soon as we got on the road heading home.

I knew by 8 or 9 on Saturday that I was going to be pretty well wiped out come Sunday morning. And I was. But that's alright, it was a pretty fun weekend even if I was in a pretty crappy mood on Friday afternoon due to some even more depressing news from my department and district. Suffice it to say that I'm not so bummed to be leaving anymore since the support crew is getting shuffled up and downgraded in quality and ability. Not good. Also, I found out who has officially taken my position at the one school that has re-upped the site support tech contract for next year. That was kind of depressing.

I also got more research time in on job leads, building out my skill list and continuing to craft my cover letters.

Oh, and I got some tomatoes planted which will be really nice. Fresh dirt, four seedlings in a half barrel in the sun and we should be very good to go! I was going to take a pic and then try to do a new pic every couple of weeks or month but time got short this morning and I had to roll out at speed to get to work close to on time (not that anyone's really waiting and watching for me but still).

Are You Ready for Some Football....Party!

Today is our annual football party to celebrate the end of a successful football pool again. I came close to the top but ended up in third overall and I'm pretty okay with that.

The football pool party has grown to become one of the times of the year when all of the old neighborhood comes together. We all either lived together or close enough to be the same thing. But since then we've gotten married, bought houses, made kids and moved. Life goes on.

But I'm looking forward to seeing pals, watching football, letting Nande play with her pal dogs and having a few beers to celebrate the Patriots taking one step closer to a perfect-perfect season.

My predictions:
Patriots over Chargers - 35-24
Packers over Giants - 28-14

Now, if I can only get myself some of those scores on the card and make a little scratch at the party.

Crying Over Picked Up Bounce Houses

Sure, the sugar rollercoaster didn't help that crash but it is a sign of a pretty good party when the guest of honor weeps for his picked up and gone bounce house.

I can highly recommend the bounce houses that have the obstacle course in them, much more fun than the simple bouncy floor deal. Not that the bouncy floor ones aren't fun, they are. But its more to have stuff to bounce onto, into and over and through. Plus it makes for some great photo opps.

Lots of noisy toys (remind me to post my manifesto to toy manufacturers), way too much candy, two little girls that really enjoyed leading Nande around on a leash, and a few meltdowns here and there but it was fun, more fun than years past because of more complete preparations.

And today is the start of the return to normalcy. Hopefully I'll get a chance to complete my website and post some more ads. My business cards have been ordered, I ordered cards from Moo.com because they let me use as many photos as I wanted. So I was able to choose five cards that gave a good sense of what kind of photo work I can do and want to do.

I am happy that we survived our part of the party season with two birthday parties for the boys. Lots of fun but I'm glad they're in our rearview mirror now. There's a ton of good stuff on the horizon.