My Nemesis …. (a rant)

Hello. This is Cliff and I’m your guest columnist for today. Andrea asked me to provide some fodder for her blog so …… welcome to my private hell!

I have a nemesis. Now, I think everyone should have an arch-enemy. We are often defined by the quality of our enemies. Think about it: Achilles vs. Hector/ Superman vs. Luthor/ Bond vs. Blofeld/ U.S. vs. USSR (damn, I miss those guys)/ Batman vs. the Joker/ Red Sox vs. Yankees/ Frazer vs. Ali/ Lohan vs. Duff/ Coyote vs. Roadrunner/ Sonny vs. Cher …. Well, you get the point.

Presently, my nemesis is a mere clerk at the local gas station. I know, I know. You’re thinking that this person as a villain is rather lackluster, not worthy of my attention as the “hero” of this piece”. I’d like to think, however, that with the proper nurturing and encouragement, she could surpass the relatively low-level bureaucratic pettiness of gas-station dictatorship and grasp the brass ring of truly cartoonish, super-villainy!

Here’s the details:

I commute about an hour to work each morning. So, naturally, I have to gas up every other day. My regular stop is this fairly large SuperAmerica in our neighborhood. My nemesis is the 50-something clerk that works there most mornings.

This place has about 24 pumps, some (not all) are pre-pay. The pre-pay pumps are not well-marked at all. Now in the morning I have a routine. Stop for gas; buy a morning paper, coffee, and pastry of some sort; then make the commute. The SuperAmerica fulfills these needs nicely but, unfortunately, I can only pay for gasoline at the pump. As a result, I typically require one of the non-pre-pay pumps.

OK, most of us have probably pulled up to a "pre-pay only" pump by mistake at some point. It happens. However, at this particular establishment ... woe betide anyone who makes the mistake of attempting to prematurely pump gas at a "pre-pay only" pump! The gal that works there will get on the horn and announce to the community just how stupid you are.

Witness:

PUMP 17 IS A PRE-PAY PUMP ONLY! PLEASE INSERT YOUR CREDIT CARD OR MOVE TO ANOTHER PUMP! WHATEVER YOU CHOOSE TO DO, YOU MUST HANG THE NOZZLE BACK UP!

This is what those in my neighborhood are greeted with when picking the wrong pump. Now you may be thinking to yourself, "What's the big deal? The pumps are marked. Get it right, Jackass!" Fair point. However, this station changes which pump at which you can pay outside and which one you have to go inside on a weekly basis. For a while they were the ones closest to the street. After that they were the ones in the row furthest south on the lot. At present, I have no idea which is which.

Maybe you still don't know why I hate this place. Well, here's the last straw. No matter what you do. Even if you don't f*** up and pick a pre-pay pump, you have to put up with the following while you clean your windows, get a soda, coffee, newspaper, doughnut, or otherwise jerkoff for 2 minutes before paying your tab:

WAITING FOR PAYMENT ON PUMP 17!

I swear to God! Today I filled up and was on my way inside when I heard the above announcement. Give me a chance to pay my bill, dammit! My car's still parked right next to the pump so it's not like I drove off! Maybe if you spent less time staring out the goddamn window and running the cash-register ... PEOPLE WOULD PAY QUICKER!

Andrea says that the next time this happens I should announce from the back of the line:

WAITING TO PAY FOR PUMP 17!

Next time this happens I’ll try it and see what sort of response I get. If I get applause from the gallery I’ll know that we’re all just anarchists at heart, waiting to strike a blow for justice against the gas station Nazi!

UP YOURS, EVA BRAUN! (And no, I don’t want that f****** “Rewards” card so that you and Alberto Gonzales can track my daily purchases!)

Live from Seattle

This weekend Harriosn and I are in Seattle visiting my friend and Harrison's god mother, Ilene. Ilene has 2 kids, Jake (5) and Gabby (4) and we are all having an amazing time. Yesterday I had to go to work in Seattle and Ilene watched the kids. They all had an blast. Harrison just loves playing with them. They played outside for 3 hours, they went on the jungle gym in the yard and for a walk in the neighborhood. By noon they were all pooped. When I got home from work they had just finished making cookies. The smells were wonderful. Harrison seemed extremely happy and having an great time.

THe next day we went into Seattle to the Pike Place Fish Market. We had lunch at a great seafood restaurant, Ivars. Can I just say YUM!!! We started with a cup of Clam Chowder and then I had Mussels. Harrison ate everything except his hamburger, chips, bread, cookies, juice and fruit. After lunch we strolled over to the fish market. I absolutely love it there. We looked at all the beautiful flowers and fresh food. Harrison loved watching the guys at the fish mongers throw the fish. We stayed and watched for a while. We also got to pet the police horse and we took pictures at the bronze pig.

Jake absolutely loves comic books and there is a great comic book store so we spent some time in there. But just outside of the store was a life size posterboard of Gollum from the Lord of the Rings..now if you remember Gollum...he was pretty scarry looking but not to my son. He wanted to hang out right in front of him and watch him. It even made noises and that didn't scare him either, he kept making me activate the sound.

Before we left the market I bought some fish to have shipped home, a whole 5-6 lb. salmon. We will smoke alot of it on the smoker grill this summer...YUMMM!!!

I had rented a car to get around while I worked so we all had driven in that car so when we were on our way home (did I mention that Harrison had no nap!! - he slept maybe 40 minutes on the way to Seattle) we got to utilize the DVD player that the car had in the roof. It was amazingly cool. We hit major traffic and it took 2 hours to get home so the kid were very content in the back watching the movies.

That night Ilene and I decided to have some fun and make some CD's. Ronnie had a gazillion songs on his computer...all the top 100 songs from 1950-2002 so we had alot of fun with the 1980's. We were laughing so hard at the songs we listened to back then. It brought back great memories and some memories that Ilene wouldn't let me forget.

On Saturday we all went to the zoo, Point Defiance Zoo. What a great zoo. It wasn't too big but it has great animals. My membership to the Minnesota Zoo gave us reciprocity at this zoo also. So I saved $20...I am such a saver. Harrison had fallen asleep in the car ride to the zoo so we drove around for a while so he could get about 40 minutes of sleep because I knew we weren't going to get another nap in. Our first stop was the Elephants. They were so close up. There were 3 of them standing right where we were. Harrison loved how close he got to them. He didn't want to leave. But our next animal made him forget all about the elephants, we saw the Tapir. Well you might not know abou the Tapir, but it is a great animal, it is big, black and grey and makes a very funny noise and Harrison just loves them. The one at the MN zoo isn't very active and is usually just lying around. The Tapir's we saw at Point Defiance were running after each other and were just amazingly active, they were indoors and outdoors and back indoors again. Harrison had me running all around to see them. We also saw sharks and polar bears and other animals I can't remember. Unlike myself who just always buys lunch at the zoo when I go, Ilene had packed us lunch and we had a wonderful picnic in the zoo.

After the zoo we headed out for ice cream. We went to Cold Stone Creamery. Another big YUM!!! Harrison must have really been tired or out of sorts because usually he finishes all of his ice cream no matter how big the scoop is. This time..he only ate about 1/3 of it. As we were finishing up a bride came into the store, not in her dress but in her veil and all made up and Harrison thought she was a princess and kept waiving at her and saying, Hi Princess!!! It was absolutely adorable.

That night Ilene and I were talking about her friend Tahiti who is a Medium. I got very intrigued and we had her come over to see if she could read me. Alot of what she said seemed to resonate with me. She started off by saying that there is a corner of my house that needs to be built up, now she wouldn't know that I have had water in my basement and that we do need to build up one particular corner. She also said that my foot has been hurting, and in fact I think I have plantar fascitis (sp??) So alot of what she said was really cool.

On Sunday Harrison and I had to say good bye to the Widers, the most amazing hosts ever, and make the long trip back to MN. Harrison and I can't wait until we can go and see them again!

Fears

Harrison is starting to have fears about different things now. He has always been afraid of the vacuum but now he is talking about other things he is afraid of. The most recent being Puppets. He thinks they are everywhere. According to Harrison there are puppets on his changing table, under his crib, and in the corner of the basement. I am sure I am leaving other locations out but those are the reoccuring ones. Luckily the ones in his room are not keeping him from wanting to go in there or preventing him from sleeping. We try to tell him that there aren't puppets there and we also pretend to throw the puppets away. That helps but they keep coming back.

Funny Little Man

Harrison has some very funny sayings. First when you ask him to do something, instead of saying I don't want to, he says:

"No, I can't".

He says it in a very matter of fact way..not all whiney.

When he is done playing with something or doesn't want to play with or watch or listen to or talk about something he says:

"I don't like ________"

For example, I asked Harrison what color shirt Jeff from the Wiggles is wearing, he responded with "I don't like Jeff" When anyone who know Harrison knows he absolutely loves the Wiggles. Or when I asked him what noise a Taper makes and he told me "I don't like the Taper" when Tapers were all he talked about for 3 days.

An Amazing Discovery

On Saturday I discovered an amazing place to take Harrison. It is called the Jackson Street Roundhouse. It is a train museum. But is so amazing for kids. They have many train tables with Thomas train sets on them for the kids to play with. Then they have all of these train cars that you are able to go inside and walk through, or run through if you are chasing a 2 year old. There is even a train bell that the kids can ring. Harrison had an amazing time here and we will definitely be back!

Very funny thing Harrison said

On Friday night we all went out to dinner at Chianti Grill, formerly Ciatti's. It was close to Harrison's bed time so I was a bit nervous that dinner may be unpleasant. But I was so pleasantly wrong. He was an absolute angel. He colored and ate and really was a delightful little boy.

At some point during the meal I was talking with my mom about someone named Mo, when all of a sudded I hear this little voice next to me say..."Mommy, are you talking about the Doodlebops?" I couldn't believe what I just heard so i asked him to repeat himself and he said it again..."Are you talking about the Doodlebops?" (For those of you who are not regulars to PlayHouse Disney...it is a trio of performers who dress up as characters ....DeeDee Rooney and Mo..and sing and dance). I was so taken back by the fact that he was listening to our conversation and thought we were talking about a character on his show that I told him "Yes, we were talking about the Doodlebops."

Harrison and Aboo's Day of Fun

On Friday Harrison and Aboo spent the whole day together. Their favorite activity to do together is shopping. Well, that was really when Harrison was younger but now you have to make sure there is something for him to do. So they went to the mall and he played in the play area. He tested her a bit by running out of the area and then back in. They had lunch together and went on some quarter rides and that is where the fun began. Harrison, being the mischevious child that he is, when told it was time to go decided to run through the mall. He totally bolted. He thought it was absolutely hilarious. We have to figure out what will work with him to make sure he stays put. The child tether (a.k.a. leash) may be in his future.

Aboo is coming

On Thursday my mom, a.k.a Aboo (this is what Harrison calls her) came to visit. She came in several hours early because of bad weather in NY. Which was very lucky for Harrison because soon after he finished lunch, Aboo came and picked him up from day care. He was so happy to see her. He gave her a hug and a kiss and was very excited for the stroller ride home. When they got home they played for a while until it was nap time. By the time I got home, Cliff had begun cooking dinner and Harrison and Aboo were playing.

THE BASEMENT IS DONE!!!

As you might recall, in October we had some water in our basement after a very heavy rain. It turned out that the walls were wet and we had to remove parts of the drywall and replace it. Well, 4 months later we are done. Cliff did this whole project almost by him self. His dad came to help actully hang the drywall. But he removed the old, moldy dry wall, hung new dry wall, and mudded the joints. I was so impressed. This would have cost us thousands to have someone professionally to do and we did it for less than $200. It took a lot longer but well worth it.

On Saturday, I spent several hours cleaning. I vacumed the basement that had dust and dirt all over. I went through clothes for good will. Moved things around and basically made the house somewhat more organized. I still have a long way to go to get it to where I want it but it was a very good start.

Harrison, for months, has been looking to go play in the basement with longing but he looks down the stairs and then back at me and says "Basements broken". But finally on Saturday, after his nap, I asked him if he wanted to play downstairs. The look on his face was sheer excitment. He practiacally flew down there. And every free moment we are all down there playing. It is great to have the basement/family room back!

Kids Expo

On Sunday I took Harrison to a Kids Expo which is like a trade show for kids and parents. I had won tickets from sittercity.com so I thought it would be a fun free thing to do. I invited Shannon and Abby to join us since I had extra tickets and becasue Harrison likes hanging out with Abby. It was a fun day but I was a bit underwhelmed by this event. What I did like was the characters that were walking around and the shows that they had going on on the different stages. Harrison loved watching them sing and dance. There were also about 25-30 bouncy houses for the kids to play in. Abby loved them and spent much of her time at the expo jumping. Harrison on the other hand was very tentative and went inside but he didn't want anyone else in there with him. He got mad when other kids would come in and then he really didn't jump ...he just crawled around.

What he did love was that there was a real pig there. He went up to it and and said hi and then "oinked". Well, the pig actually "oinked" back. He just about died. He was so excited that it actually oinked. He kept trying to get the pig to oink and it did every time. It was hard pulling him away from the pig. There was also pony rides and he loved looking at them but when I asked him if he wanted to ride on one...he was very definite about it...NO!

What I wasn't so thrilled with was the "trade show" part of the expo. I thought there would be more boutique type vendors...people selling kids stuff. But all there was were vacation spots, insurance companies, chiropractors, eye doctors and gyms.

We all did have lunch there. There was a nice food court right inside the expo and Harrison ate really well. He ate a whole bag of potato chips. I swear he is exactly like his dad.

After lunch I wanted to get some chair massages at these chiropractors so that is what I did and we left the expo around 1:30. I am glad the tickets were free.