Saturday, July 5, 2008

Five Years for Good Behavior


Our 5th anniversary started out like any other. Angie woke up first and leaned over to gently nudge me awake. She smiled at me and whispered softly in my ear 'stop farting in bed'. Even after five years, that still cracks me up.

We took the boys to the Luisenpark today. They loved it! Boat rides, ice-cream, and an awesome outdoor swimming playground. In the pool, Davey nervously stayed close to the edge until he realized the whole pool was only knee deep. He then ventured out into the middle, turned to me and smiled. Not a 'I'm happy' smile or a 'Boy, this is fun' smile. It was more like a 'I'm going to do something bad' smile.

With shoes on, I could only watch in silence from the edge of the pool, waiting for his next move. His hands slowly raised to his head and I started to realized his plan. 'No, David! Leave your hat on'. There was a slight shaking of his head as his smile widened. He plucked his hat off of his head and looked straight at me with his signature 'what are you going to do about it?' look. Shouting was useless, so I simply watched as he slowly lowered his hat into the water and began to splash around in some kind of weird victory dance.

Despite several attempts to get David to pick his hat up, his attention was too focused on stomping on his hat and laughing at me. Eventually, I gave up, kicked off my shoes and went in after him. Being the smart kid he is (good genes), he ran over to the other side of the pool, where he continued to laugh and point at me. As I reached the center of the pool, David's idea light bulb obviously turned on for he climbed out of the pool and took off running. Shit.

I raced over to where David had escaped, hoping the trail would not be cold, but he was nowhere in sight. With my shoes now on the wrong side of the pool, I was forced to run barefoot down the gravel path, cursing like a sailor and listening for the innocent gigglings of a conniving little two-year old.

I had been avoiding the area where Angie was sitting, simply because I did not want the eye-rolling and 'you lost the baby again?' lecture. After searching the entire park, though, I had to make that slow walk of shame back to Mother. As I approached, I was relieved to find the little rascal jumping around in front of Angie.

She looked at my bare feet and the sopping wet hat in my hand and smirked. There was a certain recognition there, indicating that David had already spilled the beans. Damn his new-found ability to speak!

The train ride home was fairly uneventful, other than some guy throwing a conniption fit right in front of us. We were waiting on the platform when a young kid drove by on his bike. This apparently irked the man, who turned beet red and stopped the kid. The veins in his neck strained to the breaking point as he screamed at the poor kid to walk his bike when on the platform. Ok, psycho. Switch to decaf.

Opa picked up the boys to spend the night, leaving Angie and I with a very quiet apartment. We got dressed up and went out for a nice dinner to celebrate our anniversary. Now I am not sure what lover-boy decided this, but wood is the ever-so-romantic gift to give for the fifth year. Originally I was planning on a box of tooth-picks, but in the end I opted for a nice wooden picture frame with room for three pictures. With our new creature coming to the zoo in a few months, I am sure we will fill this one with pictures of the boys.

Dinner was great, up until the point when the waitress started yelling at me for ordering wrong. It was after the meal and silly me asked for the Dessert Menu. The waitress disappeared and came back five minutes later with a tray full of tiny dessert samples. I told her I wanted the menu and she explained that in this particular restaurant, there is a dessert called 'Dessert Menu' which was what was now being shoved in my face. I explained that I really didn't care what retarded naming conventions they had for their lovely sweets, I wanted a 'menu' so I could choose my dessert. When I asked for the drink menu, she did not come back with a wet bar, so I was thoroughly confused at how this could not be confusing. The point where she huffed was exactly the point when her tip went bye-bye.

After dinner, we went to the pub where Angie and I first met. We saw old friends who were shocked to see us out. One lady asked us where our kids were and I explained that they were at home. 'They sleep through the night, now and we left the windows cracked...' Apparently that was not so funny to her, for she immediately ran over and began chastising Angie for our parenting methods. Angie gave me the you didn't look and set the record straight with Ms. Mom.
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[The boys spent the night at Grams & Opa, so no Ladder Talk]

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