Monday, July 03, 2023
Monsoon Season
It rained a ton yesterday. That in and of itself would be an occasion for me to complain, given that it's a long weekend and we just redid our back deck. But it just so happened that the rain was extra problematic because my sister and her kids and their dog stayed with us Saturday night, and the highway that they take home turned into the nation's largest slip n slide. So we entertained them all day, which we are not especially well equipped to do. Children, it turns out, have shockingly little knowledge of Vanderpump Rules and no interest in discussing the latest Jill Lepore piece from the New Yorker. Also, they deemed our bread weird and our lack of chicken strips unacceptable. I ended up braving flash flooding to go buy happy meals.
We did play a lot of Mario Kart, which is fun for children of all ages. And the Disney + came very much in handy. (I briefly considered showing them Raiders of the Lost Ark before being reminded that the ending is hella scary.) My mother taught my nephew to play solitaire, declaring that he could play it in Vegas. I have never been but that seems unlikely to me. I started a Lite Brite with my niece and quickly finished it when she lost interest ten minutes in. (It was a train.) Oh, and we found back the marble that goes with Mouse Trap. If that hadn't happened, our only alternative would have been death.
The weather cleared after dinner and they were able to head home, stomachs full of the boxed macaroni and cheese that's been in my pantry for three months. There was no water in their basement and all trees were intact. So we'll call it a success.
