Memorable Day Weekend

Time is an elastic and amorphous being, and doesn't move through my life with predictable velocity. Although it's barely been a month since our getaway to the Catskills, it already seemed like I'd been in the city for an eternity. So when Delta suggested we go visit his friends down on the beach for Memorial day weekend, I was all ears.


The next step, of course, was to pick up gifts for the Crane Kinder. "What does one buy kids who already have everything?!" Delta bemoaned our dilemma. I scratched my head thoughtfully. If he thought I was going to be any kind of help in this department, he had another thing coming.
"Erm,.... socks?"
"No, silly, it's summer, no one wears socks."
"Diapers? Rattles? A little bag for Maeve?"
So began Beevis & Butthead's journey through the world of children. First we googled a Toys'R'Us (and shuddered in horror to see that it was at Herald Square), but when we got there, we couldn't find it. Well - if truth be told, the area was so crowded and dirty, that after getting jostled around a few times, we decided in a fit of despair to abandon mission. That was when, by a stroke of luck rather than genius, we found ourselves by a GAP Kids. Ten minutes later, and we could leave with self-accomplished smirks, accoutred with shades and flipflops and sunny hats, and all the things kids would like. (It was a delight to see the thrilled looks on their faces when we handed them their presents the next day. I never thought I'd hear myself say thank gawd for GAP.)

We decided to take our bikes down with us in the bike rack on Davis' car. A perfect ploy of course, until the morning of our trip when Davis realized that some unworldly soul had stolen the bike rack from his car. Disgruntling to say the least. So with a bit of head scratching and last-minute improv, the boys succeeded in somehow strapping the bikes together onto the car roof. Not the most reassuring of arrangements, but frankly much more scary for the poor yodel behind us on the highway. The whole situation only made more comical by the fact that Delta sat peering up through the sun roof the entire way, keeping an eye out for bikes gone amiss.
And, what a perfect weekend it was too. The weather was absolutely gorious. It positively beckoned for hours of poolside lounging. And an evening of beachside fireworks. And beverages and biking and barbecues.

"We're going to be away on vacation for all of July," Mamma Crane said. "You guys are welcome to use the place if you like." I couldn't believe my ears.

Somehow I see a fun summer on the horizon.