You may recall that we adopted a puppy when we returned from our vacation in early August.  Mia’s been an, uh, interesting addition to the family.  If nothing else she’s annoyed the heck out of the elder statesman of the house, Arthur. They’re constantly
bickering over food and she’s constantly nipping at him which leads to a constant stream of “don’t touch me” yelps and
“please tell her to leave me alone” cries from Arthur.  It’s like our
kids multiplied by 10.
Actually she’s been quite the influence on him.  For instance she’s taught him there’s no reason to accept confinement and now the two of them regularly collaborate to break out of various rooms, pens, etc.  She’s also given him amnesia when it comes to manners.  Before Mia’s arrival he never sniffed at things on the table, or jumped to get treats out of your hand.  Now he’s acting like a reprobate and we’re having to remind him that we don’t have to put up with that mess.  Thankfully you only have to tell him once.  Mia, on the other hand, gets me to talking like I did 10 years ago when the kids were toddlers.  “No, no, no, no…NO” and “Down, down, down, down…DOWN” and “Shhh, shhh, shhh, Shut Up!” are now the most often heard sentences in our house, and usually they’re followed by strangled curses like “Son of bi-gerching. What did you just do, dabberflabbit.  You little shicker…aw, dadgummit I just stepped in this pile of -, OH MAN MY NEW SHOES!  One of you kids better get this mutt outta here before I sell her for parts.”

Then there’s the chewing.  If it’s on the ground it’s munched, and it doesn’t matter what it’s made of.  Metal?  No problem.  Wood?  Yummy.  Clothing?  Rags.

Yeah, we love her.

Early this summer our oldest Michael decided he wanted to try football.  He’d never played a down of organized football in his life and he had no clue what he was getting himself into, but he decided to give it a go.  All summer he attended workouts at school for three days a week, and usually three hours per day.  Weight lifting was a big part of it, and since Michael had lifted only a handful of times in the past his body soon started talking back to him.  Then there were the football drills, all foreign to him at the beginning, and the cardio training.  He took it all and persevered. Then in August he came home from vacation and went straight into full practices and started wearing the helmet in the 90 degree-plus heat.

Finally the season started and he was issued his beloved 71 jersey.  Then the first game came along against Glenn H.S. and he watched and listened from the sidelines, soaking it all in, but never getting into the game.  No surprise there since he hadn’t even been wearing pads for a month.  Then the second game against Carver H.S. came along and again he watched from the sidelines.  Last week they played their third game against arch-rival Reagan and Michael thought he might get some playing time, but it didn’t happen and he was getting pretty dejected.  We talked a lot about how it was important to keep playing hard at practice, to show that he had the gumption to pick himself up after disappointment and show what he was made of.  We talked about how hard it is to work your way into a playing position once the coaches have their rotation set.  We talked about the whole purpose being to try your hardest no matter the result and have no regrets at the end, about how the worst thing is to not give it your all and then wonder years later if you could have played if you’d tried harder.
And so Michael went back to school and practiced hard.  He wasn’t happy, but he kept at it.  Tonight his team played Parkland H.S.  His sister Erin had soccer practice and I was at the field with her, wrapping things up when we I checked my phone and saw a text from his Mom, Celeste, telling me that his team was up 26-0 at the end of the third quarter.  The message was 15 minutes old and we were 10 minutes from the game, and I figured that if Michael was going to get into a game then tonight would be the night. Erin and I ran to the car and I tried to make record time to the school.  Erin called Celeste for an update and she told us that there were about six minutes left in the game and Michael hadn’t been in yet (she was wrong, but more on that later). Of course we got stuck behind every slowpoke driver in the county on the way over there and then Erin’s phone rang and Celeste told her that there were three minutes left in the game and it looked like Michael might be going in. I pulled into the parking lot two minutes later and Erin and I sprinted to the stadium.  As I approached the fence I saw number 71 lined up in the middle of the line, nose over the center, and then the ball snapped and Michael got two fists full of jersey and stood the boy up on his toes.  The runner took the ball around the end and Michael pursued.  He didn’t get in on the tackle but he was in the mix.  A play or two later he was out of the game and another boy got a chance to play.  On the sideline Michael pulled off his helmet and I could see his smile from 50 yards away.  After the game he told me that he was put in on the punt team at the end of the third quarter, but since he’d never practiced with the punt team he had no idea what he was doing.  That also probably explains why Celeste didn’t see him go in the first time, seeing as there was no reason to expect to see him there.

All told Michael was in for five plays tonight, but I don’t care if he plays another down in his life because I couldn’t be prouder.

Last week our family had two birthdays so on Saturday we went over to Costco and splurged on some (really good) crab legs for our combined birthday dinner.  Yuuu-uuu-mmmy.  I highly recommend them.

Not cheap, but not as expensive as going out.  And since I was flying out to California the next day i really wasn’t in the mood for going out.  Truth be told I had to pack, since I never manage to do that ahead of time.

Now that we’re at the end of summer with only three working days until it comes to a crashing end, I can tell you one thing we as a family won’t be doing: we won’t be going on a last hurrah bike ride in Virginia.  Why not?  Well, we tried it last year and although it was memorable I can’t say I’d be able to get the family to do it again.

Another reason is that this summer kinda-sorta ended last week.  Our oldest is playing football at West Forsyth this year and practice started with a bang in early August, so he’s out of any kind of grand, end of year excursion.  Also, our daughter’s soccer team, for which I’m an assistant coach, started official practices last week and we just had our first tournament this past weekend and will be playing in another this coming weekend.  So this year we’ll just be trying to survive this schedule for our last week of summer:

• Tuesday
  • Back to school shopping
  • Doctor’s appointment at noon
  • Football practice 4-6:30
  • Middle school open house: 6:00-8:00
  • Soccer game at WFU
• Wednesday
  • Football Practice 8-10:30
  • Soccer practice (goalies) 6:15-7:15
  • Open house for West Forsyth 6:30-8:30
  • Soccer practice for entire team 7:00-8:15
• Thursday
  • Soccer practice 7:00-8:45
  • No football practice in prep for season opener on Friday
• Friday
  • West Forsyth football season opener 7:30-whenever
• Saturday
  • Soccer tournament in High Point, Game 1 – 11:20-1:20
  • Soccer tournament in High Point, Game 2 – 6:00 – 8:00
• Sunday
  • Soccer tournament in High Point, Game 3 – 9:40-11:40
  • Church confirmation class 12:00
• Monday
  • School starts.  6:00 am wake up to get ready for middle school bus.

Yes, I realize that much of this is self inflicted.  No one says our kids have to play sports or that I have to coach, but since this wild ride we call life only goes around once (unless you’re Shirley Maclaine) then I figure we might as well do it right.

I’ve been told that the high school years will flash by and the next thing I’ll know I’ll be eating pureed food through a straw remembering those fine times when I had teeth and my kids actually needed me for something.  Well, with weeks like this one the pureed food may come sooner than anyone expects seeing as my eyes have grown bags large enough to pack for a two week European trip and I can’t seem to stop drooling.

Ah well.

Phone rings:

Me: Hello?
Mom: Do you have some kind of brain virus?
Me: Uh, wadda you mean?
Mom: A puppy?
Me: Oh, yeah.  Well, uh, you know, Celeste and the kids have been wanting a puppy for a while and this just seemed like the right time and situation, you know?
Mom: I guess.  Bert read your post about the puppy and said some people just insist on erecting a cross and nailing themselves to it.
Me: Well, she seems to be a good puppy so far so I’m not feeling crucified yet.  Give me a few days, though, and that may change.  And you know we thought that now would be a good time because Arthur (note: our six year old black lab) will be able to kind of lead by example and so far it seems to be working. We’re hoping that’ll keep the level of trouble down.
Mom, laughing: I’m trying to picture Grandpa Arthur with the little whipper snapper.  Does he like her?
Me: Well he’s accepted her, but “like” would be a little strong.  She tries to play with him and if she gets a little too frisky he gives her a growl and she instantly flops on her back and submits.  So I guess you could say they get along.
Mom: Well that’s good.  Now, I have a question about my wireless service…

Really, so far puppy Mia has been a pleasure to have around.  Here she is with Grandpa Arthur:

So we got to spend last week on one of the best beach vacations I’ve ever had.  We spent the week at Bald Head Island (BHI) with my Mom and Bert, my brother Russ and his wife Kelly and their kids Caroline and Jack.  Before I move on I should state that I’ve never been on a bad beach vacation although two of them were not exactly relaxing: one time when I was a kid my Dad took us on a camping beach vacation near Assateague Island and we were eaten alive by horse flies, and this last spring we spent the kids’ spring break at Myrtle and had about 30 minutes of clear skies (I’m not exaggerating).  Still in both cases we managed to enjoy ourselves more than you could in most other times of your life, so saying that this last week was one of the best is high praise.

Besides the company what made the week so nice was the location.  There isn’t a bridge to BHI so the only way to get there is by a ferry.  It also has no cars so everyone gets around on golf carts.  There also aren’t any condos or high rises and there are very long beaches with a tremendous number of public access points so the beach is blissfully uncrowded and quiet.  If you go to a beach and it’s too crowded for your taste you can simply load back into your cart and head down the road to a better locale.

Best of all to me is that there aren’t any distractions like amusement parks, go kart races, cheesy beach stores, etc. to cause us to run around like a bunch of crazed tourists.  I used to like that stuff, but I’ve become a doddering old man and I really like just hanging out at the beach and spending time talking, playing games, body surfing, etc.  Then in the evening it’s just hanging out, eating too much, watching a movie or playing a game, or whatever you feel like doing.  Absolutely perfect for this old man.

Now I’m sure the kids would have loved to have other things to do, but they were troopers and they made do with movies, games, etc.  I was amazed that our daughter didn’t go into severe TXT-withdrawal when she discovered that her phone didn’t get reception in the house we were staying in.  In a way I think she kind of welcomed the break from the 6,000 TXT messages she sends each month.  I’m sure her thumbs appreciated the rest.

Of course vacations always come to an end and this one did with a bang.  The drive home was uneventful, but when we got home we inflicted a puppy upon ourselves.  You read right, we weren’t home three hours before we headed out to adopt a stray puppy we found via Esbee.  When I read her Piedmont Puppitas post I thought of my darling wife who’s been pining for a baby in some form for about 11 years and decided now was the time to do it seeing as we are also getting a kitten thanks to our kids bringing one home from their mission camp trip despite our telling them not to.  In for a dime, in for a dollar I say.

When I showed Celeste Esbee’s post and she saw the picture of the puppitas she practically leaped out of her skin to answer in the affirmative that we should adopt.  I contacted Esbee who passed my name along to the kind fellow who took in the wayward litter of puppitas and he called me on my cell.  Since reception was so spotty in the house on BHI I ended up talking to him while standing on the upper floor and touching a metal window frame to increase my antenna-like capabilities.  We arranged to meet upon our return on Sunday evening  and then Celeste and I made the wise decision to say nothing to the kids lest they try and convince us to leave four days early from our vacation.

So last night we drove to get the puppy, telling the kids only that we had a surprise for them.  As we approached the house Celeste and I could see the puppies cavorting in the yard, and our daughter Erin was in mid-sentence (a perpetual state for her) when she finally spied them and shrieked "PUPPIES!"  Game over.  We spent about 1/2 hour playing with the litter before the consensus decision was made to adopt the runt, a shy little girl that we’ve named Mia.

I thought maybe that would be all the excitement we’d get upon our return, and certainly it seemed like enough, but then this morning we heard a huge bang from our garage and went to see what had fallen.  Fortunately nothing fell, but the spring on one of our garage doors did break so now one of our cars is being held hostage in our garage.  I’m hoping my neighbor and I can free it this afternoon, but it looks like we’ll be getting a new garage door sooner than I expected.  We’re going to replace the door instead of just the spring because the door is in pretty bad shape and we told ourselves we’d do it whenever something on the door gave out, like a rusty spring. 

And of course Erin’s team, of which I’m the assistant coach, has three practices this week and a kick-off tournament this weekend, and Michael’s into two-a-days for football, and back-to-school activities begin this week.  Put it all together and you have the perfect brew for bringing me back to earth but-quick from a serene week at the beach.  I wouldn’t have it any other way.