Have a Holly Jolly Weekend

Lunch at a kid-friendly joint.
She had rainbow sherbet for dessert and thinks she can now randomly demand it.

We went out of town for the weekend. The rescue was holding its annual meeting, so we decided to make a weekend of it. We got a room on Priceline. You never know what you'll get with Priceline, and I must say that the Gods must have been smiling upon us (or maybe just Mr. Shatner), as we got a very nice room. It was actually a suite with two TVs and a handy little sitting room. There was an indoor pool and even a free breakfast (a decent one with Belgian waffles - not one of those deals where they throw a day-old muffin at you when you check out). If there was any drawback it's that the suite had two double beds. We put the kid on the fold-out couch in the other room. Now, P and I have been together 15 1/2 years. We don't spoon all night or anything like that (in fact, we have an unwritten agreement that he is to keep all body parts on his side of the bed). We sleep in a king-sized bed. Sleeping in a double bed, even for average-sized people, means fleshly contact toute de la nuit. "You don't, um, mind if I just sleep in that other bed, right?" He shook his head. The deal was struck.

We started out our trip with a visit to see some puppies. The kid wasn't as excited as I thought she'd be. I think puppies are cute but seldom have a desire to have one. Once you've raised a puppy and then fostered a few more, the novelty wears off in a big way. After the puppy visit we headed to lunch and then to the mall, where P got some jeans. We have the same conversation every time he needs jeans. At first he swears he is a 34. Then he says, "Well, maybe if you could find a 35, that would be better." And then he walks out with a pair of 36s in a bag, seeing as how that's his actual size and all.

We hung out in our hotel room for a while and then headed to the annual meeting at a nearby restaurant. A friend watched the kid while we were at the meeting. On our way to drop her off, she began to sing "Holly Jolly Christmas." Wanna hear it, here it go:

Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas
Have a Holly Jolly Christmas

I told P that I was going to drive into oncoming traffic if she didn't stop soon. I tried to teach her the next few lines but she just screamed at me and said, "NO, MOTHER! I am singing 'Holly Jolly Christmas!'" We are "mother" and "father" lately. We have no idea why.

The meeting was more fun than it probably sounds - we drank and played games and then we actually discussed the rescue biz. The rescue is still insanely busy. We have a long waiting list of people wanting to surrender dogs, and we have nowhere to put all these poor pooches.

This morning we went swimming after breakfast. We put water wings on the kid because she has not yet learned to respect the water properly. She will walk off the side and just assume that one of her parental units will catch her. We made a funny discovery while we were in the pool - she doesn't know the difference between the words "die" and "dive." She kept telling her father to "Go die in the pool!"



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