Monday, August 27, 2012

Darth Weirdo


Peter Force'd me to take this picture of him for Nicole. See, a few weeks ago she went hiking in Austria and came back with a kickass shadow-picture of her that looked like Darth Vader. Peter was impressed and compelled to one-up her by getting a snapshot of Darth walking on chopsticks. The Force is strong with this one.

Anakin then twisted my arm and asked if we could go to the bar. I agreed, but told him that he was not having any more Coke. He responded with a dramatic wave of his hand.

'These aren't the drinks you're looking for.'

'Oh, come on, Peter. Let it go. If you want a Coke that badly, just order one.'


By the same rationale, I ordered lunch. May the Foam be with you.


While Peter, my beer and my belly bonded, Tommy was busy finding new friends. Several, actually. After last night's Mini Disco's disastrous meltdown, Tommy was now known around the island as the 'Hulu Hulu' kid. Tommy thought it was cooler than me that this kid was a BIG kid who didn't speak English or German. It didn't stop him from tossing Tommy around in the pool screaming 'Hulu hulu!'.


We eventually worked out that the kid was from Holland and I began frantically looking on my iPhone for the online Dutch translation of 'my son can't swim - please stop throwing him in the deep end'.

David, who normally comes racing to Tommy's rescue, completely ignored the fact that he was almost drowned twice by Dutch-boy. He was dead-on focused on a new game that he had invented called pool-ball.


It's kinda like baseball, only you whack a rubber nerf ball with a boogie board as hard as you can until it flies over the fence and into the ocean, forcing hairy-chested beach dads with firm bottoms to rescue the ball over and over and over and over again until they get so freakin' annoyed that they ban pool-ball for the rest of their kid's life. Game over.

Angie unplucked her nose from her book long enough to hear the veins in my neck snapping and thought it would be wise to move to the hotel lobby for some quiet board games. Yeah, wise.


I have no idea where David learned to put on his 'game face' but I can say that it was far from quiet in the hotel lobby. At one point, I noticed one of the receptionists making their way over to us and I nonchalantly raised my wrist. All inclusive, baby.

After a not-so-subtle and slightly over-reluctant pause, the guy returned to his counter. My blue bracelet had won round one, but I knew that our lobby time was limited.

'Who's hungry?'

For a brief moment, I thought I had unlocked Pandora's secret to getting kids to actually shut up. It's a giddy feeling, somewhat akin to the many, many times where I was absolutely certain that I had finally discovered perpetual motion. Not so surprisingly, Angie was the one to pop my crazy bubble and lay down the law.

'Yeah, we're going to go eat now, but you're not allowed to touch the dessert bar until you've eaten your dinner.'

In David's defense, they do tempt kids that are listening-impaired with their flamboyant display of yumm.


So, yeah. What happened was that I put down our bags and left to check on David, who had run off giggling like a madman. I spotted him next to the desert bar and immediately raced over. When I finally got there, I noticed a blur racing past me. The giggling told me that it was David, but before my anger could even register, another man spoke to me. He was standing next to an enormous Jell-O sculpture and spoke with a Russian accent.

'Did you see that?'

'Not unless you can prove it in a court of law.'

'That kid just took half of this big Jell-O sculpture and ran off laughing.'

'Well, you better hurry up and snatch up the half that's left.'

'Good idea.'

I left my comrade to scoop up the last of the Jell-O as I ventured on to discover the root cause of David's hearing malfunction. I found David sitting at the table, contently and rather quickly shoveling spoonfuls of wiggly sugar into his gelatin hole. Before I could voice my reaction, Angie intervened with a gentle reminder.

'Oh, come on, Jelly Belly - we're on vacation.'

'You're right, Butter-buns.'

Based on Angie's belief that we should completely break down all forms of discipline based on the fact that 'we're on vacation' I decided to ignore Jell-O thievery and just play pool with the hooligans. At least it didn't involve boogie boards. 


Peter had never played pool before, but he surprised me by understanding all the rules right away. He still sucked BIG time, but come on, he looks cool. What else do you want?

Davey looked cool from the starting gate, but his short limbs and utter disregard for rules led to a rather interesting game.


After a few shots, I explained to David again that 'no, you are not allowed to block Peter's ball from going in with your hand.' David nodded his understanding, which did nothing to calm down Peter's twisted scowl and angry breathing. On Peter's next shot, I shit you not, David raced over and plugged the corner pocket with his elbow. As the three ball bounced off of David's arm, several things happened at once.
  • Peter screamed like the daughter Angie always wanted.
  • David looked at me and shrugged 'What? I didn't use me hand.'
  • I involuntarily cracked up and almost high-elbowed David, who was giggling insanely.
  • Peter let out a growling war-cry and started swinging his pool stick at David as he chased him around the pool table.
  • I clutched my belly and started fumbling for my camera.
  • Angie came racing out of the nearby gift shop screaming 'What the hell is going on here?'
  • The shop keeper came racing out after Angie screaming 'You no pay for that!'
  • At that point, I completely lost it and started laughing hysterically.
  • Angie glanced down at the hat she was clutching and casually asked me if I had any money.
  • I paid the shop keeper for the stolen hat as Angie went ballistic on Caine and Able.
  • Tommy wandered over from the air hockey table and declared 'I are being a good boy.'
Shockingly enough, Tommy was being a good boy. This probably had something to do with serious threats made three minutes prior that he would not be allowed to attend Mini Disco tonight if he didn't stop beating the already cracked window with a pool stick.

See, Mini Disco had become a major nightly ritual at Mariachi Bay. Angie kept nagging that the place was called Mastichari Bay. Whatever. The point was, we had inadvertently discovered a newfound method to tame wild animals. I know that parents don't normally resort to threat tactics to get their kids to behave, but we sure as hell did. And it worked like a charm. 'Heeeeeey Macarena!'


--------------------------------------------
Ladder Talk:
1) What was the best part of your day?
Peter: That I was good by the Kinder Disco and by the pool.
David: Kinder Disco and that I play pool so good.
Tom: That I could go in the pool with mine Freund.

2) What was the worst part of your day?
Peter: That we couldn't play 10 o'clock or something pool in the lobby.
David: That I got a mosqweeto bite.
Tom: That I fall down my nose.

3) What would you like to do tomorrow?
Peter: One of those laser pens I want to buy and jump in the pool.
David: I want to buy a computer or maybe a thing like that.
Tom: Want to look wrestling.

No comments:

Post a Comment