the cow says

Moooooo! 

Late this afternoon, we went on a little field trip to the veterinary school at NCSU and we got to see cows being milked. This was a first for me and the boys, and my boys were still glued to the window long after our group had moved on. 

After watching all that milk, the boys were ready for their picnic supper, which was followed by a tour of the anatomy lab. Did you know that elephants and giraffes have the same number of neck bones? And that a horse is actually walking around on just one toe per leg? Cows have two toes. Maybe instead of "moo," they are actually saying "two" in an effort to taunt any nearby horses. 

more marching

Yesterday, we participated in Moral Monday again. 

Have signs . . .

will march! 

The boys had their pictures taken about 1,000 times. 

Look! Helicopter! 

Explanation for shirts and signs: Our GOP leadership has tried to claim that the protesters are "outside agitators," so the boys were sporting their insider status, and as for the signs, we think the actions of the General Assembly are, in a word, stinky! 

no vacation!

This week, we've been in Vacation Bible School: the boys have been attending and I've been leading the grade schoolers' recreation time. It has made for long mornings and photo-less days, but everyday, Jed has remembered the gist of his Bible lesson from the day and has been, from what I can tell, an enthusiastic participant. But today, we were all a bit burned out, so when we got in the car and I asked Jed what he had learned today, he mumbled, "Nothing. They talked a lot about Jesus."

Silence.

Then, "I was ready to talk about trucks."

feeling moral

Yesterday, the boys and I joined Moral Monday, which is a weekly protest of our state's regressive legislative agenda. The General Assembly's session comes to an end soon, so next week's will be the last one, but I think we'll be there: Jed was very disappointed that we didn't have a sign or flag, so I told him we'd go with sign in hand next week. 

looking for the Governor

the mall shortly after we arrived

and then a few minutes later

Jed got to hold someone's sign for a quick photo-op

crowds look down from the top of the Legislature 

heady days

This is the first summer in many years that we've not been experiencing drought conditions so playing with the water hose feels a bit reckless, but it sure is fun.

yum, now and then

Everyone likes my black-eyed Susans.

And everyone likes now and then shots.

visiting marmie, part 3

click here for visiting marmie, part 1 and here for visiting marmie, part 2

On the 4th of July, we started our day with the highlight of Jed's trip: a visit to Marmie's fire department! 

Then we went to Canal Park to watch for big ships. 

We didn't see any of the huge "lakers" come through the canal, but we did see the bridge raise a few times. 

Then, late in the afternoon, we went to Sunshine Lake, just outside of Duluth, where we joined Marmie and Jim's friends and their families and attempted to cram the entire Minnesota summer-at-the-lake experience into a few hours.

Macon landed the biggest catch of the day! 

Jed's work wasn't too shabby, either. 

Macon couldn't wait to get on the boat and even said he was going to drive. If Jim had been our captain, I'm sure he would have had his chance. As it worked out, he was made to keep his seat. 

On our last morning, Jim and Marmie took the boys to Brighton Beach for rock-throwing . . . 

. . . rock collecting and . . . 

 firing upon enemy ships. 

And how do you know it was a great trip, besides the fact that it generated a three-part blog post? 

The boys slept on the flights. 

Normally, I'd end this here, but this peaceful image of Macon does not really tell the whole story. He slept like this for about 45 minutes, and then he woke up, and he woke up angry. He screamed, and he screamed, and he screamed. He yelled. He screamed some more. We rocked, we read, we offered games on our phones. We offered water, apple juice, a turkey sandwich, even potato chips. WE OFFERED POTATO CHIPS. Come on, man! 

But no, all were swept away with a chubby wave and increased volume. 

Now, for those of you who know Macon in person, he is one happy kid until he's not, and when he is not, he is loud. He is louder than loud. He is, possibly, the loudest child on the planet. Confine him to an airplane with turbulence so he's also confined to a seat and man, oh man, can he crank it up. Seriously. He goes up to 11. 

This went on for 30 or maybe 45 minutes. A person 3 rows behind us (3 rows in the opposite direction of the sound waves coming out of his mouth) offered a flashlight for him to play with. A person one row in front of us angrily asked if their was anything I could do, any way I could make it stop. 

Really? Is there something I can do to make him stop? Yes, lady, I'm totally holding some special trick in my back pocket because I'm enjoying this experience so much. I was flummoxed, and as I started crying, I think I mentioned something about having offered him potato chips, but I don't think she comprehended that as the exotic treat that it was. She seemed amazed at his volume (and it is amazing) and she went on, in all seriousness, with, "I can't carry on a conversation here," which I had to ask her to repeat because, guess what? I couldn't hear her. 

To her credit, she apologized "for being a jerk" as soon as we landed, and the woman who really caught the full force of his meltdown because she was directly in front of him was very nice to us, but still, I'm pretty sure every single person on that plane was happy to see us go. 

But don't worry, Marmie. We'll be back. Of the roughly 8 hours we spent in the air traveling to and from Duluth, only about 30 or 45 minutes of it was horrible, and that's a small price to pay for blueberry bread and 37% humidity.