Don't count your chickens before they're hatched

An illustrative reminder.

Maine event

Maine.

That's where we were in case you were wondering.

We left our troubles - the pink slip, the house full of fleas and a mildly depressed cat mourning the loss of her canine pal - to fester while we spent two weeks in a presidential hometown in the upper U.S.

We saw family.

And old friends.

We even met some new ones.

During the course of two weeks we had many laughs, however the best came on the last day of the recreational program at KBIA. We stayed past swim lessons so Ittybit could take part in open swim.

The Champ wasn't interested. No amount of convincing could get him back in the water.

"No. No. I'm not swimming. Nope. Not going in. Not swimming."

He was content watching from the sidelines and eating his bag of chips from the snack bar.

Until.

He noticed his swim instructor had removed her sweatshirt and was getting into the pool.

To swim with another little kid his age.

"I'm going swimming now!"

Just in time.

***

Even with all the excitement (and the anxiety that comes with it), I have to admit It feels good to be back home.

Kinda random question ...

So. Just for argument's sake.

You were ever-so-politely asked to blanch vegetables whilst your significant other was out charring fowl flesh on the grill ...

And the only pot not in the dishwasher, which was at that moment running through its cycle, was the giant pasta pot.

You add a small amount of water and put it on the front burner of the stove, turning the control to "high."

A few moments later you smell something particularly acrid, but convince yourself it's coming from outside of the house.

A few moments after that you can no longer trick yourself into believing the smell is a figment of your imagination and you quickly find your way to the stove only to realize you have, once again, turned on the wrong burner.

And that the smell was emanating from this ...



So ... This is my question ye old wise interwebbers ...


What portion of the "I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU MELTED THAT" pie should the person who placed a black television remote control on the back burner of a black stove top be forced to eat?

Tiny sliver?

Half?

or Most of the pie?

Sharing the love (and the Secret Service investigation)

the usual suspects, originally uploaded by toyfoto.

I'm blog sitting at Little Bald Doctors today and decided 'What a perfect way to share the love while Andrea's on vacation than to share the third and final chapter of the ME and the BUSH FAMILY saga over there?'

I mean, I'm friendly that way. I like to share the love and widen the investigation.

Of course, tinkering around in her bloggesphere really made me a little envious. I mean did you know WORDPRESS has password protection features and really nice interface that seems much more intuitive than Blogger? It also has automatic spacing and it does html code all by its lonesome (with the toggle of a button). All the code and spacing I'd prepped? Useless.

... But I digress

Go. Read. Make a new friend.

But please, come back.

*Pretty please?*

Ah, the good ol' dog days of summer

The other day I revealed my first experience in Kennebunkport, Me., and the happenstance of finding a beach next to the Bush compound by the light of the moon and - it would seem - the seat of my pants. Today I will tell you the second part of the three-part saga: The first time I took my then-boyfriend's (and-much-later-husband’s) dog to the beach ... alone.

Now mind you (and Jed would disagree with me about this) his dog got a little strange when we all started dating.

We had each brought a dog to the relationship (Maggie was his and Maddy was mine). And aside from the certain economy of their names --they both answered to either Maggie OR Maddy whenever their selective hearing acknowledged being called – after a brief time residing in the same house the canine pair formed a pack.

His dog, Maggie, even became a little dog aggressive. That’s not to say that she ever BIT another animal, but she did scare many-a-people at the other end of the leash who were thinking that she might. My dog, Madeline, who had previously been a coward in the presence of stranger dogs, now took a cue from her older and wiser compatriot and barked heartily at their presence out in the world.

Of course this new gang we formed – one that no longer acquiesced to the whims of its founders - barked at everything that moved. Sometimes with an insistence on stampeding towards other dogs with the force of a herd of wild boar, sending terror into the hearts of all involved.

You may see where this is going ...

Jed and I were in his hometown on a the new girlfriend tour: I was being introduced to his boyhood friends. During one portion of the weekend he was busy slowing down his friends’ golf game by agreeing to play while I had decided to take both our dogs to the beach. How bad could it be? They weren’t bad dogs.

And the day was beautiful. It was 7 a.m. and the beach was mostly empty. I had stopped at a bakery on Chase Hill and gotten myself a cup of coffee to hold in the hand that wasn’t holding dog fecal matter … (WHY DO WE DO THIS? Insist on drinking coffee on the beach when inevitably ONE if not BOTH dogs will squat and leave a present that will need to be scooped up and carried for the remainder of the walk?)

... I digress ...

The dogs were happily playing in the surf and fetching tennis balls and sticks I threw for them.

Until.

There.

There, in the distance.

Very, very far into the distance.

Almost on the other side of the beach.

Was a familiar something.

A Q-tip person: White-haired and regal, walking a boneless spaniel and flanked by two men wearing dark green windbreakers.

I knew the green men were protecting the little white-tipped dot, and the dot was walking a "Millie" clone.

I froze.

Maddy froze.

Maggie froze.

And then ... Maggie RAN.

I grabbed Maddy’s collar - lest she get any ideas about collusion - and watched as Maggie got farther from me and closer to the white dot. She seemed to be a black bullet; getting faster and faster and lower and lower to the ground as she zoomed toward the former first lady’s morning constitutional entourage.

My body was frozen but my mind reeled with panic.

OHmygodJedsdogisattackingtheformerfirstlady’spooch.

WhatdoIdo?

TheywillshootJed’sdog.

Hewillneverforgivemeforgettinghisdogkilled.

Staycoolstaycalmpretendnothingiswrong.

And then, at the very second, just feet away from her target, Maggie stopped short, sniffed a little sniff and turned around. She loped back to me as if nothing had happened.

I felt faint.

When we finally passed each other a few moments later, Barbara (as I thought of her but would likely bumble for "your majesty" if I tried to actually speak) turned in my direction, smiled and gave me a little wink. Her wordless reassurance didn’t really help me calm down, though.

In fact, I still kind of feel like throwing up.

As promised ...

First and foremost, let's finally close the chapter on the birthday that ate two months shall we?

After much hemming and hawing and gnashing of teeth (not to mention trying to decipher the somewhat condescending responses to my internets plea for help from the experts as to how I could get my computer to play nice with my new camera) I was finally able to process the photographs from Silas’ second official first birthday party.

The fact that I am still able to function after the tiny ordeal, having stayed up well into the night, is a testament to the power of coffee.

So without further ado, here they are ... pictures from when Silas turned one year and one and a half weeks:




Not sure it was really worth the wait.

Ah well, moving on to the second thing: I will try and fulfill another promise I made to my flickr friends recently about telling the stories I have concerning a certain presidential family, which, during the past two decades, has become VERY familiar to the people of southern Maine.

I must first warn you that however much I would like them to, my stories DO NOT cast a dim light on the First and second First family. Yeah, I know. Shucks. Worst still: The jokes are usually on me.

Here we go ... part one:

VIDEO KILLED THE RADIO STAR

Way back when George H. Walker Bush (that would be the former CIA man who was VP to Reagan and then a one-term president himself) was newly a former president was also about the time I got my very first almost-new car (NOT to be confused with my first nowhere-near-new car that I saved from the junk heap and spent all my part-time-job earnings trying to keep tooling down the highway).

So with this almost-new, mechanically perfect automobile in my possession I went where no one in their 20ish right mind would ever consider to go for a little weekend away: the southern coast of Maine.

Now Friends, I had never been there before on my own; didn't even know Jed from granola. All I knew was that there was a ocean and it was only four hours away.

I don't really remember much about that trip other than my almost-new car (a Honda Civic the size of a honeydew melon) gave me some trouble parking in a little tourist town called York. As it turns out I couldn’t seem to maneuver the little thing into a parking space big enough for a Mack truck without power steering. (Yes, I am a weak link.)

After a small gathering of tourists applauded when I finally managed to sidle up to the curb (pulling forward and back, this way or that, no fewer than 48 times) I got right back in my car and headed farther up the coast to Kennebunkport where, I hoped no one had seen the clown show I made of parrallel parking.

But I digress ...

Ah, was it pretty there.

Being a young and idealist photographer, not to mention a slight bit of a *cough-cough* romantic, the first night I was there I found myself lured to the Harvest moon hovering seemingly just inches over the water. I walked and it walked with me. Like a pet. ... only a pet that was obedient.

I digress again. ...

Anyway, I followed that moon - that crazy moon - up Ocean Avenue and out of town. Further and further away from the lights and the hubbub. Suddenly. A beach. A tiny public beach made of rock and boulder. I pulled my almost-new car over to the side, took my camera and tripod and hoofed it out to seaside.

Dang, that moon was pretty.

A few seconds after I’d set up my camera two white paneled vans skid to a stop near my car on the road; their lights glaring down onto me a few yards away.

They wait. And watch. No sound just blinding light.

I can’t get pictures of the moon with those lights.

I get back in my car and head back to town ... where I buy a map.

And learn I was here.

And Friends, somewhere in Washington enshrined in some little folder, is a piece of paper with my name on it (probably) ... and I never got that picture of the moon.

Click in next time (which may be days from now, who knows) when I reveal the second in this three-part harmony opus: ME and The BUSH FAMILY.