Slice of Life: Slicing into Saturday

(This is part of the Slice of Life project)

For something a bit different, I decided to document small slices of my Saturday. I made notes during the day on paper.

5:24 a.m. — Damn cat purring. Loud. Cats don’t know about Saturdays. They think every day is Monday, apparently. Get up, feed cat, start coffee. Liberal use of side of foot to boot the cat out into the cold.

6:03 a.m. — Writing, blogging, reading. Quiet in the house.

7:07 a.m. — Youngest son is up. Playing with Spiderman toy. He sends it to me across dining room table and I send it back. Repeat. Again. I tell him, no, he can’t send it flying off the table — it will dent the floor. Sad face. Too bad.

8:10 a.m. — Scrape ice off the van, drive to neighbors’ house where other sons slept over last night. Grab middle child and head off to Smith College indoor gym, where baseball evaluations for Little League take place. I hope to be spectator but get unexpectedly roped into being a catcher for what seems like an endless line of eight year olds, throwing cheese at my face. My god. My knees hurt. And my back aches. I must be getting old and want to hug the high school volunteers when they arrive. I don’t.

10:30 a.m. — Exhausted and muscles hurt. I play it up at home as best as I can. I am reminded that we have a bright orange dumpster in our driveway and that we need to start clearing out the garage (for a huge tear down, rebuild project). Ignore it and get some snacks.

11:00 a.m. — In the garage, moving junk out. Where did all this stuff come from? Good lord. It’s like Fred Sanford moved into our garage, and brought all of his junkyard with us.

Noon — Lunch. Grilled cheese, chips and salsa, raisins. Plus, a glass of flat Diet Coke, but I can live with it. Need a little sugar rush.

12:30 p.m. — Back in garage, now on the second floor. I don’t even know what most of this stuff is. Honest. Break down a boarded up window that opens up towards the dumpster. Come in handy later.

1:00 p.m. — Sugar from soda not enough. Lay down with youngest son. I am reading White Tiger and he has a stack of picture books. I doze off. I open one eye and he is staring at me. Are you done napping now, Daddy. Sigh.

1:54 p.m. — Look out back window. Oldest is digging a hole in the lawn. What is he doing? I see his metal detector on the couch. He’s digging for buried Indian treasure. All I think is that my foot is going to get twisted a month from now when I am out there with the lawn mower. I hope the value of the treasure covers my medical bills.

2:10 p.m. — Little one and I visit Look Park for the first time this calendar year. The playground is pretty dry, but snow and slush and mud is everywhere else. Some of the Christmas display lights are still up. He asks, Does Santa die? No, I answer, startled by the question.

2:49 p.m. — Quick. Buckle up. Rush home. Little one has potty emergency and the park restrooms are not yet up and running. Good thing we live about five minutes away. Phew. We made it.

3:12 p.m. – Up in the garage again. This time, I pretend I am an olympic champion, using my javelin toss to throw boards, planks, siding, gutters, poles and all sorts of stuff out through the new opening (see above) and into the dumpter with a satisfying “clank” that echoes through the neighborhood. I won the gold medal, of course.

3:39 p.m. — On the floor, making a Thomas the Tank Engine train track. Inspired by the sleeping train at the park. I realize that we have a lot of cool tracks. My son wanders away and I am still there, on the floor, not realizing he is gone. Luckily, no one sees me (and you won’t tell, will you?)

4:10 p.m. — A bit of reading.  I just got a new book about making comics and graphic novels — great insights.

4:18 p.m. — OK, inspired. I start drafting out a comic about an adult neighbor I had when I was a kid. He called himself Scarecrow and he almost torched our entire apartment complex down when he used a can of RAID and a lighter to get rid of some mud wasps. (Don’t try that at home)

5:20 p.m. — Dinner: chicken, mac and cheese, salad.

7:00 p.m. — Babysitter arrives, kids are happy-crazy, so we leave for a fundraiser for the boys’ elementary school. It’s a silent auction, adult-smoozing-time.

10:04 p.m. — Arrive home carrying a bucket of audio books, kid toys and other things we really didn’t need but won anyway in the auction. It’s for a good cause, right?

10:45 p.m. — Bed.

What was your day like?

Peace (in the hours in between),
Kevin

10 Comments
  1. This was fun to read, Kevin. I always wondered how you spend your “free” time. Just as I imagined…every minute is filled. That’s why I call you Bionic!

  2. Ah! You succumbed! and brought home future clean-out-the-garage fodder. I’ve done that more than I can say. Now I just pass on it, remembering that I still have stuff from when my midgets were at the school fundraising age. I need to clean out the garage,too.

    I so enjoyed this post–it will be a treasure when these boys get married and you can stand up in front of the future in-laws and say endearing cute and potentially embarrassing things to send them off in the best possible way: with a lot of love and affection. Thanks for this!

    Elizabeth
    http://peninkpaper.blogspot.com/

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