baygirl66

July Fourth Weekend

Well here it is. The long awaited entry re my parents visit
over the fourth of July.

It starts out with their arrival on Wed night. Brian and I
had worked hard to get the apt ready deptite Tom peeing
once again on both the arm chair and sofa within days of
their visit. I think next time we are going to invest in
some Depends when he sleeps over. The cats I can take doing
mistakes, hell they are animals after all. But when someone
gets so over drunk he forgets where he is and pees in his
sleep then that is ridiculous. But anyway. They arrived
about 8pm. We talked alittle and all went to bed around
11pm. Brian slept on the sofa and I they were in Brian's
room. We had to put tape on the light switch so dad
wouldn't turn off the computer by mistake.

Next morning Brian left for work and I realized he had put
so much water in the coffee pot that it was all over the
counter. With one of my wrists sprained from the earlier
weekend it was alittle hard to clean up as had been
showering, but I managed. I got mom and dad set up and said
to be over at the school by 10:15. Dad was giving a talk to
the kids about the Olympics. That was actually pretty cool.
The older kids asked more questions and got to try dad's
jacket on where as the younger ones were just fun. Mom had
several on her lap and had fun too. They met afew of the
other teachers.

They left about 11 and went out to shop. Apperently Linens
and Things is going out of business...more on that later.
We went out to eat at a bbque place that night ,..Jack
Stack. Mom was impressed by the italian last name and the
food was awesome. Dad wanted to take home the bbque sauce.
Again more on that later. We then went to Elephant bar for
dessert.

The next morning we headed out. I had a plan for the Plaza
in mind but the day went a different rooute. After
breakfast at Mcd's,yuk!! we hit a garage sale. It was okay.
I mean there are so many other things you can spend your
money on, but dad got this projector for his old diving
reels. And I got Xmas ornaments. Then we went by thi shouse
that had an unusual sign on the window. This was one of a
zillion photo ops for my mom. Incluing the barn swallows
and chipmunks around the apt. I guess they don't have
those in St Louis.,,,,!!

But anyway we went to this Outdoor shop called Cabella's
which they weren't too ompressed with. Brian was in a pissy
mood and mom kept coplaining about how much dad shops.
OOps, considering there are about 10 big shopping mall
areas in and around KC not including small towns like
Westin. And from there we went to the Legends shopping
center. They were enthralled by the Dinosaurs inside the
Trex eatery and dad spent alot of time shoe shopping. We
ate at Granite City where Brian and I had appetizers, mom
and dad had salads. It was another great meal. Seriously
though we met this woman who had rescued this wolf pup and
had him in the car with her. It was beautiful. Mom wasted
no time asking her if she could go see it but the woman
said the animal wouldn't be able to handle that. I think
she just didn't want to do it. I approached a wolf b4 at a
MS walkathon and the full grown animal accepted me just
fine. Mind you the wolf was chained to the wheel of her car
at a mall in the middle of the parking lot....

But anyway, we went to get some supplies for bbque. Yes mom
we have more than one grocery store here and yes once again
there are more than one grocery store here,..and yes how
many times can I say this .. Of course mom gave us money,
again,...was getting alittle frustrated by the constant
parental purchasing,..but we got the sauce dad liked and
then beer, which yes you guessed it my mom insisted she
buy, then we bbqued. Actually had a good talk with dad
about houses and living in KC et all, while Brian made the
baked beans and burgers. After a nap by the guys we headed
off across the street to watch the fireworks. And Kora was
there with her family. It really was the high light of the
day. Watching it with Kora on her birthday!! Was really
memorable.

Next morning , man we seem to be stuck on McD's for
breakfast,..not that we didn't buy eggs and bagel's and
cream cheese especially for breakfast. We told them the
first part of how we found the Italian grocery. Their last
words were oh why would you want to bring coolers down
here? Well 150 later they realized why. I tried to write a
check for it but mom tore it out of my hands and ripped it
up. Alittle embarrassing,. I mean can I not pay for
anything in my home town,..She gave me her famous look like
okay whatever ,... Then we headed to the City Market. Wow
it was good. Mom had this theory to go up every aisle and
then buy. Then she said to always have two pockets of cash
so no one knew how much you really have. Like okay once
again whatever. This isn't a search and destroy mission in
the Saigon, this is just grocery shopping. The "high" light
of the shoppinh there was the shirt dad picked up in this
very specific type of culture shop. Very shall we say gang
related. He said he is going to wear it to my brothr's
wedding in Puerto Rico. I wonder if he will get stopped and
searched before he reaches the plane? Brian didn't have
the heart to tell him what the image signified and I was
hiving way too much fun thinking of my poor brother's face
when he sees it.

All the way down to the Plaza they kept asking ,..is this
it? And I kept saying no you'll know it when you see it. No
the Power and Light district wasn't it, no the two or three
strip mall areas weren't it,..no seriously you,will know it
when you see it. Well we got there and they were impressed.
Mom decided we had to eat at The Cheesecake Factory. It was
okay.They were very interested in our waitress since they
aren't too happy with Mike's fiance. I mean they think that
Mike is some innocent and Jen is some big bad influence and
is going to make him this ego centric maniac who golfs and
likes fancy things. I think I remember Mike working at a
car detailer at 15. And being a golf caddy at 16-17. And
who was it that has had vacations twice a year to Colorado,
Florida, and skiis at least once a season? Not me or
Charlie. And who had the five foot by four foot set in the
wall aquarium and the plazma screen tv in college? This was
before Jen. Anyway back to the story.
Mom had to smoke outside the restaurant which just
irritated the heck out of her. I guess when you are getting
up every night to smoke on our back area and every morning
and every evening, being limited was just uncalled for. Oh
did I mention dad had to drive the whole weekend because
she didn't want to miss another chance to smoke? While on
her lunch smoke break she struck up a conversation with a
street walker by bringing up the conversation of can you
guess smoking. How do I know that was what she was? Mom
asked her. I told her later that she may want to be careful
who she feels so friendly talking to. You would think she
never was in a big city and had no street sence whatsoever.
We made a deal with them though. If we payed for dinner
then we would let them buy us a vaccuum cleaner at you may
have guessed by now, Linens and Things. Then we went
looking around.
First was the cigar store. Once agian mom mentioned the
new law and the manager said she could light up in here,
whcih she took advantage of. I was a bit embarressed. I
mean he was probably just trying to make sure she/we bought
cigars. Then there was the furniture store. Then was
another shoe store. The couple of ones Brian and I went to
paled in comparison.
Next we dropped off our coolers yes they realized that it
was a good idea to bring those after all, before the
vaccuum. There was this big ordeal about whether or not to
just get it or look at Target's. You see there were no
holds and no exchanges/returns. If were up to Brianand I we
would have taken our chances, gone across the street to
Target and seen what theyhad. No no ,mom had to ask the
manager and try to to the we are only here for one day
crap. I guess he wan't buying. Not like we couldn't have
called Target to get a competitor's quote. So she stayed
with it and off the three of us wentto Target. The exact
cleaner was there for a whopping 30 dollars more. I
actually would have prefferred to buy it there for the ease
of mind aspect. We drove back over to Linens and got it
home. Dad insisted we try it out. Hell what dif did it
make ,..we could't take the damn thing back. But I think it
gave him a buzz being the good parent. So we played along.
That was when they decided they wanted one too. The only
one left had been the floor model. After calling to other
Linens they decided to take a look. Back they went and left
us home. Beers and showers later they returned. Over to Fox
and The Hound we went. We finally got to pay. I figurd
sooner or later they would have pestered us enough to buy
something so the vaccuum I could reason was a reasonable
thing. Our favorite waitress was there, Kristy, so we sat
in her section. Once again they remarked how cute she was.
re Mike's fiance. I guess they need to realize that the
wedding is in November.

Next morning before they left Mom made her sauce and
meatballs. And did the you have to come to the wedding
campaign. Already told her no but gave her the curtosy of
listening and pretending I would think about it. Then she
wanted to know what I was going to call out vaccuum
cleaner, yes you read that right...our apperently was
Stallone and theirs was Sylvester. Maybe dad was smoking
some of what was on his shirt...After they left Brian and I
went to Linens and bought with our own actual money some
stuff we needed for the apt. Shower curtain, trash can,
sheets, table linens. There were afew things that weren't
necessities, but they were reasonable. Then we went to get
groceries, ..I thought mom's sauce needed afew componets. I
called Robb when I got back and entertained him. Oh and on
the way home they bought 18 pounds of chocolate for 10
bucks. Like why????

Gosh I felt like I still should have been doing something
with all the travleing we did. And I really am tired of
eating out. I don't know why they felt so uncomfortable
with eating in. Or us spending money. I am surprised they
let me buy anything in the Jockey store. Not that I wasn't
greatful but shit! I mean it was no trouble. And they
never showered the whole time they were there. It wasn't
like I didn't have a clean shower,...I had the towels out
for them and even mentioned it a couple of times. I could
see if it had been an overnighter but they were there for
four nights.

Anyway Have at it
I Debbie