As described in yesterday’s post, 2014 exited with a certain
amount of flair as the Latin Mafia conspired to produce another memorable New
Year’s Eve party. We ended up back at
the Maine Musquetera’s house around 1:30am after cleaning the party location
and recuing the debris from the food table and liquor caches. We sat around the kitchen table until the
ladies started into one of their patented late night endless
conversations. Since it was 2am I
declared victory and headed to bed. An
hour later my wife joined me (at least this is what I was told).
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| Wife, PanaGal and Maine Musquetera Yesterday Morning |
At 4am the phone started ringing and I experienced one of
those weird moments of waking up in a strange house. I’m sure my experience was augmented by
earlier beer supply reductions efforts.
It turned out the Maine Musquetera’s nearby elderly mother in law was experiencing
a health crisis. Per instructions from
the spousal unit I went back to sleep and awoke around 7am to find her next to
me.
After taking Buddy out for his walk and morning
constitutional along the Messalonskee Stream (yeah I had to look it up) I
returned to a fairly quiet house where my wife filled me in on her pre-dawn
adventures. Unbeknownst to yours truly
sleeping the deep sleep of the truly innocent (well sleeping deeply at least)
she had accompanied the Maine Musquetera and her husband to the mother in law’s
house and had returned to bed just before I awoke.
The Musquetera returned to the house shortly thereafter to
report her mother in law was doing better and would be coming home from the
hospital shortly – best news. We had to
get on the road home but she insisted on taking us out to breakfast despite
operating on less than an hour sleep (it’s how she rolls). She took us to Big G’s which is a very
informal place in nearby Winslow. You
have to be fully prepared to eat because the servings are immense and breakfast
quickly morphed into brunch with the immense amount of food we were forced to devour.
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| The Ladies Outside my New Favorite Breakfast Spot Too Bad Its So Far Away |
We got back on the road after farewells and I’m still
completely enamored of the new 70MPH speed limit on the Maine Turnpike, especially
on a lightly travelled day. I can imagine during the summer crunch there are
enough New Jersey drivers blocking the left lane (as their God given right) to
reduce the joy. Yesterday we only ran
into a couple of them and they were easily bypassed. We had to make a pit stop in Portsmouth to
drop off some items with my son. I
re-learned the important lesson of travel planning with a middle aged
bladder. I bypassed the last rest area
in Maine only to be confronted with an occupied lone bathroom in my son’s
apartment. Luckily the ABFA graciously
vacated while my son nervously saw me eying his roof deck. He was even sicker than reported but made a
gallant effort to hug his mother since he wouldn’t be seeing her for a few
months as she flees the cold weather. It
would have been unfair to linger given how sick he was feeling and besides my
wife and the PanaGal had bigger prey in mind.
Since we just happened to be in sales tax free New Hampshire
my wife wanted to do some shopping (huge surprise). I adamantly refused until I elicited a couple
promises of focused shopping only for the items she was looking for. She’d had a couple TJ Maxx gift cards burning
a hole in her pocket since Christmas.
She was in search of new luggage for her upcoming trip and the delay was
minimal since she found what she was looking for quickly. My hulking presence over her shoulder had
nothing to do with her enhanced decision making skills (or so I’m told).
Upon reaching home I devoted the rest of the day to watching
the entertaining (if not for the Florida State fans) college football
playoffs. This long called for system
was a rousing success setting up a true national championship game next
week. I’ve written before about my wife
and packing suitcases; it’s almost a competitive sport for her and she immediately
immersed herself in packing the new suitcases for her trip next week.
Buddy the Wonder Pooch who performed his role in our new year’s
travel expedition flawlessly took this time to claim his prize. Since I was
semi-comatose in the family room and the Latinas were chattering upstairs he
took advantage of the darkened kitchen for his own favorite sport – counter climbing. I was finally roused myself from my
somnambulance by mysterious sounds from the kitchen to find him scarfing down the
last of his trophy. I was horrified to
see a completely empty plate that had been earlier filled with more than a
dozen chocolate brownies!
I apprehensively asked my wife how many had been left,
hoping she and the PanaGal had hit the plate before Buddy. She was equally dismayed to tell me the plate
had been chock full. Buddy knowing he had
screwed up royally slunk away downstairs as I nervously scanned the internet
for information on chocolate and dogs.
There was nothing soothing to be found as all reports were chocolate is extremely
toxic for dogs.
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| The Counter Climber Strikes Again No Worse for Wear This Morning |
The only recommendations were to monitor the pet and if he
started experiencing symptoms to rush him to the vets. Buddy thence spent the rest of the evening
with me watching football and wondering at his sympathetic treatment in the
face of his crime. Regular readers of
the blog will remember some of his earlier gastro-intestinal adventures and I
was prepared for the worst; especially this morning as I walked downstairs. I was heartened when I heard him moving and
then joyous when I found no evidence of projectile vomiting or some of his even
less pleasant bodily functions. He seems
fine, alert, and none the worse for wear.
I will never understand this dog.
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