Policing Up Happiness

Yesterday was a long but ultimately rewarding day even though I had to spend three hours of it driving through my least favorite state, Connecticut.  Once again the reward for the drive was my favorite daughter and son in law.  However before that was accomplished we had a bit of excitement at work.

The State police K-9 unit periodically comes to our facility to train their beautiful dogs.  A huge state policeman showed up at my door yesterday morning and asked if they could do that.  They had four new dogs they were putting through the paces.  One of them looked a lot like Buddy, only with a pair of balls (both literally and figuratively).  I love being around dogs and spent the morning listening to them sniffing around outside my office.  For some reason they seemed to alert repeatedly on my door – it could have been the lunch I was zapping in the microwave.

The Dog Alerting on my Office Door

Shortly after lunch the fire department showed up for a fire alarm that went off at the new building across town.  Since we were the only address they had for our company they showed up here.  Simultaneously the Worcester city cops showed up looking for one of our employees.  He was also across town and they headed off behind the fireman.  We shortly received word that he had been arrested.  That started up a whirlwind of a rumor mill.  The lobby lawyers were loudly proclaiming that the K-9 unit had alerted on the arrested employee’s car and that lead to his arrest.  That was absurdly untrue but truth is not something lobby lawyers feel constrained by.  I spent the better part of an hour meeting with the union and cajoling said lobby lawyers, inflicting the truth on them.  It made for an entertaining interlude.

The real entertainment lay ahead though.  I got home in plenty of time to make the drive down to Connecticut to meet the train my daughter guesstimated she would make.  My wife was likewise putting the final touches on re-cleaning her already spotless house when I received a text message from my daughter saying they caught an earlier train and that meant we had to leave immediately.  Pandemonium ensued as my wife hurriedly cleaned herself up and got dressed (proving once again that she can do it) and we headed out on the road to New Haven.  The traffic was steady but I think Connecticut is trying to lure me into a false sense of security because we made it down to New Haven in record time and pulled into the station just as my daughter’s train was.

Eyes Filling Up

One of the true joys in my life is seeing these two excellent people emerge from the doors of the train station.  It’s always a breath catching moment and for a couple of seconds I have trouble focusing my eyes as their arrival seems to be consistently preceded by some sort of pollen that causes my eyes to start filling up.  We were shortly all mounted in the car headed for Zorba’s and some much needed pizza.  My daughter demonstrated some truly Herculean patience by waiting nearly an hour before seizing control of the radio.

A Very Happy Mom

Zorba’s was Zorba’s, which meant we had a fabulous time.  The gorgeous waitress that I worship from afar stopped by for just a quick hello so I got that fix for the week.  The time spent with my daughter and son in law was priceless.  There never seems to be enough time and that which we do have seems to speed up when they’re around.  We left Zorba’s in just enough time to make “last call” at Ronne’s for some outstanding ice cream and then returned home.

Zorba's!!!!

Return Fire - Some Very Happy People - My Wife and I

My daughter immediately launched into fixing whatever bugs seemed to be attacking my home computer that arrived with my wife’s novellas.  I was exhausted at the end of the day but the universe seemed a whole lot friendlier because of the company I was now keeping.  Today it gets even better.