Hook, Line and Little Stinker

It’s summer which means taking trips to cottage country. It's called cottage country because you could be in an entirely different country in the amount of time it takes to drive the 100 kilometers (or 4,000 teaspoons for your American readers).

One of my eldest daughter’s highlights of any visit to my in-law’s cottage is fishing off the dock with her grandfather. My father-in-law never fails to buy worms and have a Spongebob fishing rod on the dock when she arrives.

Why does "Plankton Plug" sound do dirty to me?

Like most Canadian kids who grew up in a more rural setting I too was into fishing. I remember at the age of five having a fishing rod with a comically oversized plastic hook on the end. Oh the number of broken lamps I caught in our living room.

Leroy Brown: The one that got away

By the age of nine I had a tackle kit filled with lures, bobbers and other shiny things that stupid fish might eat.

For fish that like to eat turds

For honest fish that returns money clips, even when they are empty.

For fish celebrating Pride

I have fond memories of standing by the roadside with my father, both of us in spring jackets and ball-caps with company slogans on it. We are a family who couldn’t give a shit about sports so I don’t think either of us ever wore a cap with a sports team on it. We both owned Canada’s Wonderland hats though. No family vacation was complete without a hat to show everyone we had been there.

"I have not, nor will touch these fish with my hands until they are breaded."

Anyway, we would stand by the road with our lines in the water, surrounded by other dads and their kids in their spring jackets with their lines in the water. It was perfect for us antisocial folks who could tell any other person to shut up because “you will scare the fish away”. Fact: fish don’t have ears. Hence why they don’t wear regular eyeglasses, and only prince nez glasses.

Make out! Make out!

We would stand there for an hour, my father baiting my hook and removing fish I caught, before heading home where he would then clean them, which is a polite way of saying eviscerating them in order to devour them.

Why the sad face Mr. Fish?

We had a family friend who was the very picture of the outdoors man. He spent his time fishing and hunting. There wasn’t an animal he wouldn’t kill in cold blood. He started taking my father and I out fishing at the butt crack of dawn. We would stay out until the sagittal trail of sunset.

Once this family friend took my whole family for a “boat ride”. This entailed dropping my mother and I off on a small island to pick blueberries while he and my dad when fishing. We had no water or food, only the blueberries on the island. They came back about six hours later. Honestly I can’t pretend to be certain that it was six hours as one hour adult time is equal to three weeks child time. The only thing missing from the day was a hungry bear chasing me in circles on that tiny island for the entire six hours while Yakety Sax played in a loop.



From that time on I always brought a book with me and in one outing would manage to read almost an entire novelization of a movie that I was not old enough or brave enough to watch.

This book helped me seem cool in junior high.

This book did not.

Because of this I have always left my daughter’s fishing adventures in the very capable hands of my father-in-law. However, last week during a week long visit to the cottage he was absent. After stalling for three days by offering to colour My Little Pony pictures my daughter became impatient and said, “I want to go fishing. I don’t even like My Little Pony. Where did all these colouring books come from anyway?” So I had to take over.



The first step is baiting the hook. I am a person who in science class pretended to be Mormon to avoid dissecting frogs and worms. It just goes to show how smart the teachers in my high-school were that I succeeded in my ruse.

"So what do you have against cutting up animals and boxer briefs?"

I started by grabbing a whole worm and shoving it onto the hook. It was at that point I wished it worked like cartoons from the 30’s and the worm just hung onto the hook rather than having to impale it.

It’s a harrowing experience letting a child have a steel barbed hook. They want to cast the line in themselves, but these are people who can’t even eat ice-cream without spilling it everywhere. The hook is flying through the air narrowly avoiding eyes and testicles before finally landing in the water.  Because of the precarious way I put the worm on the hook it fell right off (or jumped, the coward) and I had to reload my daughter’s hook.

I quickly realized that 1) this would be no fun for her to watch me squint my eyes and pretend to not be bothered by holding this snotty greasy animal for a good ten minutes each time, and 2) the fishing trip would be over in a matter of minutes if I kept using full worms, which would work for me, but the difference in time would be filled by a long droning chant of “I’m bored”.

Wanting to try and keep my daughter interested in fishing, I decided to start cutting worms into smaller pieces and putting them on the hooks. In my wife’s family there is a tale oft told about one of his kids fishing and asking my father-in-law if the fish got hurt when it got hooked. He off handedly answered that they did not as they had no nerves, and was faced with suspicion and disbelief, only years later to be vindicated by a friend of the family who reported back to him that a biology teacher confirmed his story.

Recently my daughter asked him the same question about worms and she got the same answer from him. I thought back to this story as I used an ancient rusty knife in his tackle box to cut the worms in half. I tried hard to pretend to be cutting cinnamon rolls to be baked, as my safe place is in the kitchen making delicious baked goods. However a cinnamon roll doesn’t ooze guts or start barrel rolling when you cut into them.

Like worms, tastes best fresh from the oven

As I watched this chunk of worm spin, It reminded me of my daughter when I try to put her to bed when she’s overtired, just rolling and rolling in the bed.

When it comes to fishing with the kids the fish caught are placed in a bucket of water and kept until the end of the fishing event and then tossed back in the water. It’s sort of a catch, terrorize and release system.

To a fish this is the equivalent to waterboarding

I of course have to remove the fish from the hook for this to happen. Being a tremendous pussy I found a pair of work gloves so I would not have to actually touch the disgusting fish. If you take anything away from this post let it be that fishing = slimy.

Of course one idiot fish decided to swallow the damned hook. Stupid idiot! That meant I had to get the hook out that was now embedded in the fishes genitals (I think, again I’m Mormon so I skipped that lesson). I considered cutting the losses and leaving the hook in the idiot fish, but that would have meant quickly learning how to tie a new hook on the line, and I had had enough new experiences for one day I tell you. I yanked and yanked and heard tearing inside the fish. My daughter saw the gills and yelled “Blood!” and ran away. If only a 38 year old man could get away with the same tactic I would be free. After what felt like a feature length version of an all fish version of Saw I got the hook out and threw the fish back in the water, It floated for a second and then swam away I assume to reenact an all fish version of Born on The Fourth of July. I on the other hand told my daughter it was lunch time so we should quit for the day. The day she learns to tell time and knows it’s only nine o’clock in the morning I’m dead.

"This fish almost made my Daddy throw up!"

Get Your Potatoes In!

I spend a lot of time in the playground after school. It’s a great place to meet people with similar interests and hobbies as me such as: sleep deprivation, getting feces out of clothes without leaving a stain and how to keep children from opening the bathroom door while in use. It’s also a great place to learn the newest and coolest playground games.

I have already covered the thinly veiled sexual assault known as “Kiss Tag”. The current game of choice in the school yard is “Grounders”, which is a type of Marco Polo tag on dry land.

Oh shit, that's not a game of tag. Those people are trying to abduct her!

I’ve spent the last few weeks observing and making notes on this game without the children spotting me. Many parents and police officers did, which is why I’m starting a kickstarter campaign to both further my research and raise bail.

"I understand I'm under arrest, but why did you remove my pants?"

Grounders has a ruling class who decides the initial fate of all players. The “King Counter” is a Benevolent Dictator that decides who is “it”. I say benevolent dictator because though King Counter is in charge there is a wing of government below him that has some influence. That is the Song Chooser, who chooses which rhyme will be used to decide who is “it”.

Despite using only one hand, Napoleon was a hell of a tag player.

In Senior Kindergarten there is four main rhymes in rotation right now.

Each Peach Pear Plum

Come on, they already have six inch claws, jaws that can bite through pine trees and now some idiot gave them guns?

“Each peach pear plum
You are not it, or your very best chum.”

The player this lands on chooses another player who is also exonerated with him. This instantly creates jealousy and hurt feelings as some other child with a complex will whisper “I thought I was his best chum,” through salty tears as he cries himself to sleep that night.

This rhyme also has the added bonus of being an unpopular four course meal menu.

Eenie, Meenie, Meinie, Moe

“Eenie, meenie, meinie, moe
Catch a tiger by the toe
If he hollers let him go
Eenie, Meenie, Meinie, Moe”

The question is why catch a tiger by the toe? You should go for the throat. If he hollers let him go? Of course he’ll holler, you are subduing a wild animal here. This is a very inefficient way to get medicine for erectile dysfunction.

Nothing goes to waste.

I also remember when I was a small town rural child in the 70’s the word tiger was replaced with the n-word. That’s right... “necrophiliac”.

Dip Dip Chocolate Chip

“Dip, dip chocolate chip
you are not it.”

I’ve also heard a variation from older kids:

"It dit dog shit,
you are not it"

Listening to these rhymes made me think back of the incredibly violent rhymes we had as children.

“My mother and your mother were out in the yard, hanging up the clothes.
My mother hit your mother right in the nose.
What color was the blood?"
(Person counter ends on picks a color, counter spells it)
And you are not it."

If you really wanted to fuck up the King Counter you would pick a colour like “turquoise”.

My money is on the one on the right. The one on the left has a glass jaw.

Once you have the person to be it. They count to ten, or whatever a five year old can count to so the other players can run off onto the playground equipment. Every kid does the same thing, they count as fast as they can in hopes that the other players do not get very far. I wish anytime there was a counting situation in life this would happen. That would liven up shuttle launches and New Years Eve.

I remember being in Ottawa at Capitol Hill for New Years Eve in 1999. The Hill was crowded with people and a mist of pot smoke encircled your ankles. The countdown was projected on the Peace Tower, but whoever was in charge of the slideshow either hadn’t bothered to double check the slides, or had spent some time lying face down in that mist. The numbers started at 10, went to 8, then quickly jumped to random numbers some of which were upside-down. This is similar to how a five year old counts while being it in tag.

Then the player who is “it” closes their eyes and tries to tag the other players. This is a loose rule as most kids are squinting so hard they develop bright white laugh lines within a few minutes of playing.

The other players are supposed to always be off the ground, and if the player who is “it” calls “grounders” while someone is on the ground rather than on the playground equipment that kid becomes it. Most of the time the children trying to evade being tagged lie and yell back “No One!” This then leads to an interesting Catch-22. The kid who is "it" knows, because he was cheating, that there was indeed someone on the ground. However, in arguing his case he would then incriminate himself proving he too is a cheater by having his eyes open. Often this is cleared up by either saying the unpopular kid was on the ground, who is so desperate for attention will gladly be it, or everyone sulking and shouting, “I’m not playing!”

Again, I wish that in adult life we could do this. For example during a presentation in a Board Room an executive points out a fatal flaw in a project, the presenter could just yell, “I’m not playing!” and leave the room. Then everyone would just move onto the next item on the agenda.

"But if it's on a Power Point, it has to work!"

The other rule in grounders appears to be that anything at anytime can become “T.O.” or time-out. My daughter is particularly is fond of this. When the kid who is “it” even comes close to her she shouts. “This pole is T.O!” or if she is helping out a friend will pick a colour, “Red is T.O.” Oddly, most of the time all the kids are fine with this. She tried to use me as T.O. a few times which lead to me shouting there was no way I was time out and to get off of me. As she was tagged she saw me as a traitor that day and looked at me the same way Han Solo looked at Lando Calrissian in Cloud City. I am not a fan of Star Wars so I had to watch an online clip of this scene. I really don't see why people are so gaga over this flick. It looks pretty cheap and awful to me:

The other quick way to get out of being tagged is to yell, "I’m hungry," and leave the playing field to get a snack, then eat at a painfully slow pace so the others won’t wait for you to return to the game or hope your father gets tired of standing around and wants to go home. Spoiler alert: He does.

Heart Attack and Banana Vine

Last Sunday I took part in the Becel Ride For Heart. I wish I could say it went as smoothly as margarine through my arteries but ironically, the ride nearly gave me a heart attack.

Those of you who read my last post know that I devised a foolproof way to raise money for the cause. Those who didn’t read the previous post are obviously self absorbed assholes. My plan was not to ask anyone for money, and it worked! I fundraised by writing my sponsors' names on my body and although no one came forward to get the top tier, I raised more than zero dollars!

Representation of what the top tier of sponsorship.

Actually given my lack of enthusiasm at asking for money I think I did okay. I’m not going to give you an honour roll of pictures of people who donated, but I will throw this picture of the top sponsor’s name:

Before

After

I hadn’t thought much about my connection to heart issues, but when my parents donated money in memory of my grandparents I was reminded that many members of my family drop dead unexpectedly from heart attacks. I remember that after my grandfather died we were cleaning out his house and I noticed that he about a third of the way through a Robert Ludlum book,  I imagined him wandering around the afterlife looking for someone who had read it that could tell him how it ended. Since then I try to read obscure books quickly.

A fitting tribute, no?

The ride was tough. It took me about 90 minutes to do the 25 kilometre ride, with my eldest child attached to the bike. She, of course, was on a bike attached to mine - I wasn't just dragging her along the asphalt by the ankles or anything. My wife had the baby in the Chariot, or given how much she screamed in it “The Skinner Box”.

Yesh, just learn to press the red lever and you'll stop getting shocked.

We almost missed the starting cut off due to a last minute bathroom break. We were literally some of the last people to start the ride, which meant we missed the glut of A-type people who awoke at 6:30 in the morning to conquer the event. We hand had come from a drinking event the night before coupled with a baby who wouldn’t sleep. Here’s a tip, you know you are in trouble for the next day when you are walking home and you find yourself saying, “Who the hell would have a baby out this late at night?” only to find that it’s your jacked up baby with the sitter.

The ride started out fun along the Gardner Expressway which sits above ground level. I was close enough to the city smog to write our names in it. My daughter had a good time looking at the elevator going up the CN Tower, and all the other riders on the road. It wasn’t long before she got bored and started just talking at me. She is in a phase now, where I no longer have to acknowledge or respond to the things she is saying, “Daddy, what if this road was a pony, and we were ponies. Ponies that could fly and when we got off the road we all ate cake? Cake in the shape of ponies!” At first I tried to answer the hypothetical questions. “Well sweetheart, that would mean we were a pony riding on a pony’s back and I’m pretty sure cake isn’t good for ponies.” About 30 minutes in I responded with “yup.”

The flaw to this system of ignoring her is that I don't notice for hours after she's fallen off.

I think one of the hard parts of this event, unlike a marathon, or a walk is that people are of varying skill levels, equipment and patience for one another. Many people on very fancy bikes whipped by me as a blaze of spandex, while we were like a huge jabbering snail plodding along on the road, at least that was when I wasn’t walking the bike complete with pony spewing daughter up the hills.

It was supposed to look like a squid. I know, I know many other people already pointed it out.

The thing that struck me as most fascinating was the sounds during the ride. There would be a pop, and a sound of rushing air followed by a “Fuck, shit, fuck!”; the noise a punctured tire naturally makes in the wild.

As ridiculous a notion that dragging our kids behind us was, it was way better than the parents of small children that let their kids ride their own bikes. I heard parents screaming and struggling to stay balanced while keeping pace to their children who were riding in circles or dragging their feet on their tiny bikes. I imagine those parents are still out there a week later hoarse from yelling begging their children to keep pedaling.

"What do you mean these peddles aren't just for show?"

At the midway point my daughter got very bored. If ever you thought that driving a car while a child asks every few seconds how much longer the drive is, try physically dragging their sorry asses at the same time.

We happily got to the end of the ride to find the most anti-climactic end ever. I had imagined that we would triumphantly use a last burst of energy to pedal across the finish line to cheers, confetti and gold bullion thrown our way. Instead the one lane road caused such a jam of bikes that everyone had to get off their bikes and shuffle along trying not to bump into the guy ahead of us. Plus, because we were among the last riders, workers were deconstructing the starting line when we arrived. Nothing feels like a real accomplishment like teamsters swearing at one another, “Why am I carrying all these fucking things? You lazy piece of shit!” I would have plugged my daughter’s ears if I hadn’t been trying to keep the bike upright.

"I swear, we all really did bike it."

Because it was so late into the day and we were all starving, we decided to sneak into the VIP lounge for their brunch meal. We were told that it wasn’t allowed, but because it was the end of the day and no one really cared, we should go in. We were of course the only people standing in line without a fancy monogrammed shirt, so I felt rather conspicuous.

My plan was to eat quickly, and head out before anyone noticed that we shouldn’t be there. My brother in law decided to keep a low profile by having all the kids in our group go to the centre of the hall where announcements were being made and dance on a stage to music blaring along with a slide show on the giant screen behind him. Let’s just say he won’t be an undercover officer anytime soon.

It did however affirm that naming our next child “VIP” will ensure being allowed into anything.   

Selling My Body One Inch At A Time

I have been described as an introvert most of my life, which has always pissed me off. According to Wikipedia introversion is "the state of or tendency toward being wholly or predominantly concerned with and interested in one's own mental life... An introvert is likely to enjoy time spent alone and find less reward in time spent with large groups of people.”

After lengthy conversation with my wife I realized that I don’t like being classified as an introvert because it tends to be seen as some sort of fault. If it’s so bad, just where is my disability parking permit, which I assume means I can park in the middle of the mall right in the line up to see Santa, or in the “As Seen On TV” booth during other seasons.

Just back it up next to the Veg-O-Matics

It’s not that I’m an introvert, so much as I don’t give a shit about most things. I have no passion about politics, I have my own thoughts and opinions, but not the drive to debate someone else about them. I used to do a lot of comedy around Toronto, and going to a party filled with performers always gave me a headache. I tended to hang with the non-performers and wished desperately to say “Let’s be truthful here. You aren’t going to come to my show, and I won’t be coming to yours. So let’s just stop talking about how great the process of building a show is.” to the other performers.

Umm... yeah. I'll have to check my calendar...

I think the place my introversion or nihilism has had the worst effect is when soliciting donations for various charities. As a child when the school would have kids go door to door with catalogs to raise money I would only hit up my immediate family and grandparents. That would get me maybe three orders for the cheapest things in the book. On the day the products arrived at the school for us to deliver to our customers I would be holding an automatic card shuffler and a candy jar with a cow on it, while other kids had garbage bags of shit and playing with their new Polaroid cameras they won for meeting selling quotas. I would win one of these for participation:

Look a skinned testicle with googly eyes!

A note to the kids out there:

A Polaroid camera was a magical device that required no cables, Bluetooth technology or a trip to the Walmart to print pictures. This technology was pushed off the market by the huge USB conglomerates in the late 90's.

Also Edgar Winters used it.

Recent charities I have tried to get sponsors for were simple things like Movember. A charity that raises funds for prostate cancer research by participants growing a mustache. I guess the idea is to look like an asshole in order to save one. I did this a couple of years ago and did get some criticism that it was a pretty easy challenge. My argument was that someone walking for an entire weekend or other physical challenge indeed have a harder time physically, but mentally mine was harder. Hearing the snickers and same joke, “When are you going to start growing it?” day after day.

Shouldn't I be dating Minnie Driver or Winona Ryder?

The best part of this charity was that it was quite evident I was involved, which meant asking people to sponsor me was unnecessary as they would just bring money to me knowing I wouldn’t be making a damned fool of myself for no reason.

My wife on the other hand is an amazing extrovert and A type person who isn’t afraid to corner people, turn them upside down and shake money out of them. I’ve watched in horror as she approaches people who weeks ago might have said in passing they might want a ticket to this fundraiser or might donate to that charity, and with the power of only her talking, reach into their pockets and remove money.

She never ceases to amaze me at her ability to raise money and work for charitable or community organizations. This summer she will be talking part in the Friends For Life Bike Rally riding her bike from Toronto to Montreal, a trip of 600 kilometer (or 160,000 quarts for American readers). I’ve watched her awaken early a few times a week to train for this event. This is normally a woman who actually sleeps through the entire “Curious George” soundtrack that resides in our alarm clock. Songs so annoying it makes me want to gnash at the clock with my teeth if it plays more than the sound of the CD loading.

She’s amazing and is working very hard. If you want to donate money to someone who is busting their ass to do an amazing feat, donate to her by clicking this picture:

Kicking Ass!

That however is nothing compared to what I am doing. I will be participating in the Ride for Heart on Sunday, June 2, 2013 in support of the Heart and Stroke Foundation. They have various lengths of rides on this day. I laugh in the face of 50 kilometers, guffaw at 75 kilometers. 25 kilometers, I take that very seriously. Hey, don’t forget to add on the 11 kilometers to get to the start of the ride.

The ride goes along the Gardener and DVP. Which of course, due to the Gardner's dilapidated state means I am taking my life in my own hands. I will also be taking my a five-year-old's life in my hands as she will be attached to my bike during this ride.

I'll be wearing a hard hat over my bike helmet.

My daughter will be on the trail-a-bike, that attaches to the back of my own old rusty bike, like a parasite on an already dying host. I call this contraption “The Wiggler” as every time my daughter decides to dance in her seat it makes me yell, “What the hell are you doing back there?” Which then makes her yell, “Look at me with no hands!” Which then makes me swing my head around to yell at her, “Knock it off!” Which makes the bike turn suddenly, which throws us off balance and off a cliff that magically appears on Dundas Street in downtown Toronto. 

Godammit! Stop that!

Though there will be no car traffic on these roads during the ride, I promise to swear and merge erratically as though there is. Perhaps you would like to sponsor me for every swear word I utter during the route, or better yet every swear word repeated by my daughter. Let’s say $2.00 a swear.

But really why sponsor me? Because I have incentives. Depending on the amount you sponsor I will write your name on a part of my body the day of the ride. Refer to the picture below for rates:

Legs- $20.00
Arms- $40.00
Face- $60.00
Forehead - $100.00
Ass- $400.00
Groin - $2,000.00

I will take a picture of your name written on my body the day of the ride and email it to you shortly thereafter as proof. A few rules: I will only write your real name (example: Jen Hendriks) not crazy made up names (example: Douchy Ballface). I will not accept group or corporate donations to reach any sponsorship levels including the coveted groin area. Though there is more than enough room to write your all members of your group, I feel that would be cheating. 

So please help me reach my goal by going to my donation page and shelling out some cash you cheap bastards.

Cherry Poppin Daddies

I’m always on the lookout for good family activities in Toronto. Especially for the few weeks after the big Earth Day cleanup when my usual game of dodge the hypodermic is on hiatus for a few weeks. My wife suggested we go see the cherry trees blossoming at High Park.

High Park is a 400 acre municipal park in the west end of Toronto created in 1876. The name “High Park” was coined due to the shear number of hiding places for teenagers to hide and smoke up. The land was a bequest to the city by prominent 1800’s hippie John George Howard. Let’s face it, his name is only missing Paul and Ringo.

"Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds"

Before moving to Toronto and meeting my wife who is very knowledgeable about flower and fauna, my only real interest in cherry blossoms was the “candy bar”. A treat that was like biting through granite to get to a radioactive cherry. I grew up a block from the factory that made these, and you could find them littered on the streets around my house. Like a Wonka Chocolate Factory that just didn’t give a shit anymore.

This looks sexual, but also disgusting

A few years ago when my eldest daughter was little we went to see the trees that only bloom for a few days a year. The day was a cloudy and a little drizzly, but the trees were spectacular, the air fresh and the space free to run in. Not so this year. Much like Mecca there was a pilgrimage of thousands heading to the trees mostly for the Sakura party, a Japanese celebration and viewing of the cherry blossoms at their peek. The walking trails were crowded, the streets that cut through the park were lined with cars idling in traffic while small children hung their heads out the windows knowing that they were so close to fun, yet so far away.

NATURE!

We decided to skip entering the giant crowd to get close to the trees. As no one had eaten lunch it was decided to stop to eat our picnic prior to tackling and eating one of the many Japanese people there for the party. Besides they usually run away when you look hungrily at them and say “itadakimasu”. Damn my need to follow tradition.

"Can I get that to go?"

The picnic was very close to the Jamie Bell Adventure Playground, a sprawling structure that resembles a castle. There are many towers, slides and levels for kids to play through. Many of the little nooks and crannies are too narrow for even a svelte young man like me to fit through.

"Person who guesses how many Cheetos are in that bellybutton wins a kiss!"

This means that you can’t follow your kid through the roughly one block area of the structure. You catch a glimpse of your kid and then they are gone. Just as you are about to speed dial Liam Neeson, you catch another glimpse before, like a mouse in your pantry, she’s gone again. I wish to rechristen the playground “Panic City” as a result.

Like Game of Thrones for kids, with little less beheading and sodomy

I did try to follow my daughter once through the labyrinth under the structure but quickly got stuck a la Winnie-The-Pooh. She decided that one spot would be her “bedroom”.

With all the comfort of a labour camp

I found a brilliant way to keep tabs on my daughter while not nagging her to stay in my view with the added bonus of getting her out of the park to go home within the ten minute warning I laid out. I told her she was a Princess whose castle was being threatened by a evil dragon. She then endowed me as the King to help her. I agreed to be the King, but I had lost my keys and could not get in the castle as a result.

"Damn it! I wouldn't have lost it if you kids gave me a "World's Best King" keyring for Father's Day like I asked."

I then sent her on a mission to find a magic ruby that had been lost ages ago in a well made of tires (King Midas perhaps- huh? Clever? No? Shut up.). She ran off and came back with it. Then she needed the scepter that the magic ruby was to be set in, and that was in halfway down the slide at the far end of the playground. She ran off and returned saying she dropped the ruby part way down the slide and would have to go again. For a moment there I thought she was on to my game and trying to draw out her play time.

Slides are a playground's lower intestine

When she came back I told her she needed the help of an evil witch to activate the ruby, but not to worry because the witches enemy is the dragon so she would be happy to help, provided she be polite (always sneak a lesson in when possible). She could be located at at the top of the tower closest to the exit of the playground. Some of you may be seeing where this is headed... She did that and I told her she then had to tap the dragon with the ruby to change him from evil to good and save the castle. I gave a description of the dragon matching her uncle who I knew was napping outside the playground. She went and whacked him with a stick. Then I told her that since we were out of the playground we may as well head home. I’m not sure she’ll ever forgive her uncle for his betrayal. Better him than me.

fâché!

And for those of you how are annoyed I didn't actually put a picture of the cherry trees in:

There you go fuckers. And you can thank Jennifer Hendriks for the awesome pic. I didn't take one single photo of the trees.