The old bait

and switch.

Today, I'm having a detailed technical discussion about the many options we have for implementing multi-VID on multiple power supplies with the guy who replaced StinkyJ when I changed sites, and my cell phone rings. I look. It's The Mrs. The Mrs. calls me for all kinds of inane reasons, so I've stopped interrupting my work to take her calls. Like the postman, if it's important she'll ring twice.

Like just Tuesday when she called to ask me where the hospital was, since she had to take HannieC there for a trampoline-induced injury. I don't actually know where the hospital is, but I know where the urgent care facility is, and I sent her there. By the time they had the x-rays developed, HannieC was jumping around and dancing. A false alarm.

I get the voicemail buzz, but The Mrs. does not call back again. Thus, not important. I finish up my discussion. When I check the voicemail (about 20 minutes later), I hear this message from The Mrs.

About half the men in the neighborhood are at home right now riding on their lawn tractors. You aren't.

I look at my watch. It's 4:45. The parking lot is almost empty at this time of day on a Friday. I'm still not used to that concept. But I figure, hey, The Mrs. wants me to come home and drive The Childrens around on the lawn tractor. Fine. That'll be fun. I head home.

When I get there, I find that the neighbor is parked in my spot in the driveway, and two of her kids are running around with my kids in the front yard. This does not bode well.

She and The Mrs. are engrossed in some conversation about the new minivan and the rear view camera that turns on and displays on the GPS screen when you go into reverse. Then she says, "OK. I have to go put groceries away. I'll be back." And she leaves.

Hmmm...so I came home to drive the lawn tractor, and now there are not just the normal two screaming childrens, but there are four. The Mrs. says, "I didn't want you to mow the lawn. I just wanted you to come home."

But wait, it gets worse.

The Mrs. decides to take MaxieC to go get the mail, leaving me in charge of three childrens, only one of which is mine. Happily, they are a pretty well behaved bunch, and all I had to do was explain the working of the ponds and pumps to the boy while drinking a Keystone Ice.

Then The Mrs. came back with MaxieC, and things got even easier.

Then the neighbor came back with a martini shaker in her hand. She and The Mrs. disappeared into the house, and came out with little glasses of something. The Mrs. then proceeded to instruct me that I was in charge of all four childrens so that she could sit with her friend by the waterfall and pretend they didn't have kids, since her friend had "brought happy hour with her." Naturally, at this point MaxieC decided he needed to go inside to watch TV, the girls needed to go to HannieC's room to play, and the neighbor boy had to play on the swingset. So I had to watch 4 kids in 3 locations whilst two perfectly able womens sat and drank something that came from a martini shaker. (The Mrs. now informs me the were lemon martini's.)

Yesterday was the second installment of Fat Camp, Mile High Edition (FC MHE), since the boys weren't capable enough to organize one last week without me. It was my 10th anniversary last week, and I figured I had better spend it at home rather than out drinking with the boys. Looking back on it, I'm not sure if that was the right decision or not.

I had an epiphany at FC MHE. That is that there are four things that when combined, really exceed the sum of the parts. The first two are an air hockey table and a tube top. Your going to have to guess what the other two things are.

I promised The Childrens we'd get an air hockey table if we moved here. Now, I'll have to get The Mrs. a tube top.