Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Cousinly Love


It's amazing how quickly weird kids bond with each other; it's like they can sniff bizarreness from a mile away and come racing in for a whiff of each other's peculiarity. It's been over two years since the last reunion of the oddballs, but it only took two minutes for the future nutcases to bond. It took another 2 seconds for their true colors to come shining through.

'Great! Lovely! Now let's get this freak show on the road!'

Speaking of, we couldn't find Angie, so I went back inside to try and find her. I heard strange grunting noises coming from the kitchen and walked in to find her hyperventilating into a bag. I raced over to see if she was okay, only to realize that Angie had her head shoved halfway down a bag of potato chips. I guess Mama likey American chips.

'Yo! Snack attack, pack up your feedbag and let's go!'

Whackos one through five kept with the whole 'normal and crazy theme' as we got ready to board the ferry.



'Ferry? What ferry?' you ask. Personally, I don't think you really care. I know I didn't. It was a boat and this was enough to entertain five normal-challenged kids. Does it really matter where we were going?

The Love Boat was way before David and Stephanie's time, but I guess nautical romance has no boundaries.



Cute, but in a weird way. I broke up lover boy and told him to go look for a boat built for ten. Instead, his fault-riddled mind instructed him to run his hand along a wooden railing that looked like it should have been replaced back when Angie still had bangs.

'Buddy, don't do that - you're just going to get a splinter.'

'No, you're the spinter, not me.'

'Okay, have fun.'



Luckily, Mama Tweezerhands is trained in treating pint-sized morons that don't listen to their incredibly wise and undeniably hot fathers.

I've been known to brag on occasion, but Angie took the cake when she gloated repeatedly - 'who got the splinter out of David's hand? Oh, that's right - I did.'


'Yeah, that's great and I congratulate you and your massive cranium on being able to pull out the pencil-size toothpick that had barely broken the surface. Bravo, mein Schatz! Bravo!'

Honesty can sometimes get you into trouble. But every now and then, if you're lucky, it can make crazy-mad-furious women scurry to the lower decks to fume as their more-than-fit hubbies bond with the weird class.


We docked and herded the odd ones down the street to a nice German restaurant that Christine had picked out.

'Um, Chris - you do know that we just came from Germany, right?'

'Yeah.'

Peculiar, but at least they served American beer, so I felt it was culturally balanced. Angie thought that she might have spotted a Marshalls and ran across the crowded street screaming like a madwoman. My wallet and I looked at each other in surprise. Had Angie really just disappeared to go shopping until the food comes?

Angie came back as the food was being served. The good news - it was not a Marshalls. My wallet and I breathed a collective sigh of relief. The expensive news - it was still a store that accepted cash and Angie had taken spending money.

Halfway through their first bite, the craziest three tried to impale themselves on metal spears. I, of course, grabbed my camera and raced off to shoot first and save later. Better get used to them bars.


After 'Three Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' we grabbed some popcorn and settled in for part five of 'Puff, the Nutty-ass Dragon'.

On the way back to the Ferry, Mom bought us a round of coffees and we stood on the corner playing Charades. 'Cause that's normal, right? At one point, Peter asked if he could have a coffee. I shit you not; I laughed and chuckled the rest of the way back to the ferry. Thanks, Peter - good one.

At one point, Angie noticed that she was missing one of her earrings. I gave my most sympathetic 'shit happens' shrug, but apparently this is not the preferred reaction from husbands that give a damn.

'We need to go back!'

'Go back where?'

'Everywhere!!!! We need to find it!!'

'Uh, the boat's leaving in three minutes. Can you maybe narrow down the search any?'

Angie didn't exactly say that she hates me, but her eyes did. For about three minutes, I felt really bad that Angie had managed to lose an earring. After that, I was perched at the front of the boat putting Leonardo DiCaprio to shame. As he should be.

After anchoring at the home port, Angie took the new recruits for their first liberty call. My first port visit did not involve sitting on the dock of the bay, but I did not have my mom as the tour guide. I can safely say that we're both glad about that.


Angie is fascinated with seashells, so when she began frantically pointing and screaming 'LOOK!', Peter probably just assumed she was pointing out the 500th mollusk of the day. I tried getting a picture of Peter's reaction, but it only took a fraction of a second after getting a glimpse of what Mama was pointing at for Peter to run away screaming like a little girl. Damn, I need a faster camera.


'Peter, where are you going? Come on, it's just a jellyfish.'

'Aaaaaarrrrrggggghhhh!!!!!!!'

We caught up with Peter ten minutes later. Actually, I almost tripped over him, thinking 'Man, the homeless are getting younger and younger.'


I guess he was slightly out of breath after escaping from those 'evil jell-o fish that can jump out of the water and suck on my eye'. With that statement, Peter won the prize for being the least sane person. Not an easy win, trust me.

Shortly after, we headed back home to let schizoid-boy swim a victory lap in Dad's pool. The problem is, Peter cannot swim. Instead, he decided to jump in a raft with Tommy and squirt water into his face.


I tried to figure out where Peter gets his 'mean prank' gene, but I was too busy laughing my ass off. Don't worry, Tommy - you'll have your day.

Just when I thought things could not get more bizarre, my dad came home. It's amazing how quickly weird kids bond with strange grandfathers.


We (I) somehow managed to get the kids in bed. When we (I) came back down, we (I) found Angie, in the kitchen. With a bag of chips. Again. At least this time she was not inhaling cholesterol; she had the bag inverted and was gobbling down the last few crumbs.

'Hey! Here's my earring!'

Before I could even congratulate her, I sensed her regret in vocalizing the discovery. I'll lay out what I think her thought process was: Steve knows that I had my head in a bag of chips this morning > Steve's an ass > Steve knows I lost an earring today > Steve's an ass > Steve just caught me with the same bag of chips > Steve's an ass > Steve is probably going to put two and two together and write some embarrassing story about how I lost my earring this morning in a chip-eating frenzy that tasted sooooo good. At least my wife knows me well.
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Ladder Talk:
1) What was the best part of your day?
Peter: Patrick and the boat.
David: When Stephanie she laughed and she is so little.
Tom: When we go on the boat.

2) What was the worst part of your day?
Peter: When you laugh at me over the jell-o fish.
David: When Oma go home.
Tom: When Peter shoot the water in my eye.

3) What would you like to do tomorrow?
Peter: Go swimming in the pool with Patrick and Stephanie.
David: To go to Oma.
Tom: To shoot Peter in the eye.

2 comments:

  1. glad you guys are having a good time and missing Heidelberg!

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  2. Thanks, Medwyn - we're missing Wales, too! We might have to plan another road trip soon... :-)

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