I'm so freakin' smart that sometimes my nose actually starts to bleed. When Angie told me this morning to 'take the monsters and get the HELL out of my house', I hatched the perfect plan - ice-skating! I didn't quite understand why my nose didn't immediately start gushing, but Mommy Dearest was searching for coat hangers, so we got the hell out of there. As requested. I was actually not aware that there are places open on Sundays other than pubs, but hey - live and learn. Brian was the teacher for today's lesson. He called this morning and suggested going to 'The Ice Rink'. I thought it was an odd name for a pub, but whatever; Angie was on her Sunday rampage and suddenly frosty beer sounded mighty tasty. I'm in.
We got to the rink and, aside from my initial disappointment for completely non-alcoholic reasons, we were confronted by a long line of other dads who had apparently been chased out of their caves. After spending almost an hour getting into the damn place and waiting in line for skates and Kevlar helmets, the kids were tuckered out and wanted a break. What? We haven't even gone on the ice yet, you lazy-asses!
I actually think they were just being chicken shits because a) they've never gone ice-skating and b) as we approached the rink, a 30-year-old man did the most awesome and incredibly painful face-plant right in front of the kids. Come on, guys - this is gonna be FUN!
Even David, who completely cracked up at the poor injured man, shook his head and pointed to the bleachers. Brian and I quickly realized that we would not make it on the ice without a little liquid courage. It was also my first time ice-skating and after watching Mr. Nose Dive, it did not take a lot of arm twisting to pound a few drinks.
In hindsight, we probably shouldn't have let them drink so much. Of course, that's pretty much the advice my liver gives me on any given Sunday, so I could hardly blame the caffeinated crew for ignoring us as they gulped two Cokes and a Fanta in preparation for kissing ice.
Dalia and Brian have skated before, a tid-bit of useful information that was conveniently left out during the planning discussions for today's fun outing. When we finally did get on the ice, we watched as Brian and Dalia gracefully skated away. That doesn't look that hard.
What was hard was the cold ice floor that my ass slammed down upon mere seconds after pulling away from the gate. Peter would have laughed, but he was too busy holding on to me until his ass found a nice and not-so-cozy spot next to mine. David, who is normally far from being the sensible one, shook his head again and explained to me 'I are not big enough, Papa. I go now sit down, okay?'.
It was about that point that I realized what a colossally stupid idea it was to try and teach a three and five-year old how to ice skate on my first ever escapade. Instead, I joined Davey on the bleachers and delegated the father-son bonding to Brian.
Dalia and Brian have skated before, a tid-bit of useful information that was conveniently left out during the planning discussions for today's fun outing. When we finally did get on the ice, we watched as Brian and Dalia gracefully skated away. That doesn't look that hard.
What was hard was the cold ice floor that my ass slammed down upon mere seconds after pulling away from the gate. Peter would have laughed, but he was too busy holding on to me until his ass found a nice and not-so-cozy spot next to mine. David, who is normally far from being the sensible one, shook his head again and explained to me 'I are not big enough, Papa. I go now sit down, okay?'.
It was about that point that I realized what a colossally stupid idea it was to try and teach a three and five-year old how to ice skate on my first ever escapade. Instead, I joined Davey on the bleachers and delegated the father-son bonding to Brian.
In the end, this actually turned out to be more fun, at least for me and David. We had a ball cracking up at Peter's repeated attempts to bring down Mr. 'ooh-look-at-me-I-can-skate'. Peter continued to weaken Brian and after about an hour, Peter finally succeeded in dragging Broke-back Brian down.
David's cheers for an encore were ignored. Maybe the preceding five minutes of laughter and finger pointing played a role in the subsequent curtain-call on our Sunday matinee.
I came home to find that Tommy had taken a power nap for, uh, pretty much all day. Judging by Angie's bed head, I deduced that Tom was not the only one who had snoozed away Sunday. Peter and David racked out in no time at all, but Tom...well, he wasn't so sleepy.
Tom started to charge me, so I of course grabbed my camera. This was actually a three-picture sequence, but the last shot got a little blurry when Tom jumped on me and started beating me in the face and neck with a wooden sword. It must have been a damn good idea, though, because soon after the father-son smackdown, my nose started bleeding. Thanks, Temper Tom!
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Ladder Talk:
1) What was the best part of your day?
Peter: When I go ice-skating with my Dalia.
David: To go skating on the ice.
2) What was the worst part of your day?
Peter: When I couldn't play with Dalia more because we go from the ice place.
David: When I cannot have a C.D. because it is too late.
3) What would you like to do tomorrow?
Peter: I want to play with these skates.
David: To play with Peter.
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