Flippin Out

Mindy was up near 7am and out of bed before me. She alone was taking Bella to her first gymnastics event at Westland HS. They needed to leave around 830am. I was shortly after Mindy was in the shower and quickly downstairs starting some coffee. Greeted by cloudy skies and rain. My plans to spend the early morning hours planting flowers and working in the yard were dashed. When I last checked the forecast on Friday there was only a 30% chance of rain for both Saturday and Sunday.

Judging from the radar, it looked like heavy all day rain to me. How depressing! All along, Mindy’s plan was to have Bella compete in her early event and then come back home since her 2nd event wasn’t scheduled to begin until 1230pm – a 3.5 hour gap. It was raining heavily when she and Bella left the house around 830am. As such, I held off on a run until it slowed down some. Looked like a brief break in the rain would come around 930am.

While I was staring off into the rain, Mindy & Bella were already back at home. It was 945am. Wow, that was fast. I belly ached a little about the crappy weather but then headed off for my run. Felt a lot better once my run was behind me. I was fortunate in that I didn’t get too wet. Shortly after getting back home the heavy rain returned. The skies/clouds were really dark.

Mindy used the time in between gymnastics events to clean out Jacob’s closet, ridding him of several piles of clothes that no longer fit. And amongst them were many still with tags. Her motivation motivated me to address a couple of nagging tasks. Namely, sorting, filing, ridding my mail pile. I kind of lost track of time as 1115am approached. Was caught off guard when Mindy asked if I was ready to head back to the gym. Uh, no! I hurried through a shower and was ready with plenty of time to spare. So was Jacob.

I guess I would’ve been more bummed had the weather been sunny and warm while we were at the gym meet. As it was, it was once again pouring rain. On a positive note, Mindy & I were thrilled that Bella’s meet was local instead of a 100 mile drive to and from. Heck, it was even on our side of town. And since it was our team’s event, we didn’t have to pay to get in. Jimaken and Molly were  to meet us there, but we arrived well ahead of them.

I hadn’t been inside Westland HS since mid-October of my sophomore year, 1974. Little did I know that Friday would be my last day attending the school. That following Sunday my mom abruptly made me go live with dad after Sunday dinner at Grandma Lantz’s house. In retrospect, probably the best things that she could have done for me. As for the school, not much has changed in 40 years, though it does look a bit more dated and lot smaller. Heck, back then it was still considered new having been built in 1971. Ugh! Just saying that makes me feel really old.

While waiting on Bella’s event to begin, Jacob and I walked the halls as far as we could checking out the wall of fame and then some posted artwork. Bella’s 2nd event was trampoline. Jimaken & Molly showed just before the completion started. Bella did good, but the competition was better. She placed fifth out of five girls.

Her third and final event started seemingly as soon as the trampoline vent concluded. She placed fifth in that event, too, but once again she did really well. In fact, it was the first such time that she completed the full exercise as designed – a front hand spring and then three back hand springs without stopping.

We were on our way home by 145pm. Wahoo! By then it had stopped raining but more was on the way. I hadn’t eaten a thing all day. I was hungry and so was everybody else. Mindy made arrangements for Jimaken and Molly to stop over after lunch to pick up the kids. We stopped at Cane’s chicken on the way home. It wasn’t my choice, but it would do in a pinch.
The Canes was just OK but filling. In fact, once I finished I at once became incredibly sleepy. Jiamken & Molly stopped at Taco Bell and must’ve eaten there. They didn’t show up at our place for another 30 minutes or so. They hung out for a while, Mindy & Molly chatting for quite a while. The kids gave Molly a Mother’s Day gift while they were there too – a hanging basket of petunias.

Jimaken, Jacob and I tuned into the draft and the Vikings were on the clock. They ended up the day Saturday with 6 new players and all of them on the defensive side of the ball. I started to falls asleep just about the time they all left. Mindy called me up to show me all the clothes she pulled form Jacob’s closet for charity. Seeing that motivated me to do the same exercise in our closet. Mindy agreed to organize and document if I pulled out everything I didn’t want.

Within 20-25 minutes I had amassed an enormous pile of clothes, anything from old black t-shirts to dress slacks and shirts. About halfway though, I had to remind myself of the goal - to rid myself of stuff I haven’t worn in over a year. Part of me wanted to save several of the items but I fought the urge. I’d been meaning to do that exercise for a couple years now. Felt good to knock it out.

Back downstairs I watched more of the draft and napped. Mindy must’ve been napping too. She was upstairs I and wasn’t hearing a peep. She came down about 90 minutes later confirming that she’d been napping. By then it was close to 4-5pm. By then the sky was clearing, and checking out the radar confirmed that the rain was gone. Hooray! I walked the pug around 530pm. By then the sun was trying to peek out from the last of the clouds.

Mindy and I were undecided how to spend our evening, whether to stay home or go somewhere. Both of us were tired, however, must’ve been around 630pm when we agreed to pay a visit to CBC. Thinking we showed up there near 7pm. We parked across the street. Decent crowd on hand. Chatted with some peeps just inside the door. Soon found a couple free stools at the bar. Most of our favorite CBC folks were working. Surprised to find Kevin and Kate both serving in lieu of working the bar. Working the bar was Vince and blank. Vince asked if we both wanted a Bodhi, which wasn’t on their beer menu. Actually, no, we decided to try a guest stout. More specifically, Hoof Hearted’s Voltan. It’s very good.

As he often does, Vince soon brought us an order of risotto balls. The two women sitting next to us asked, “what are those?” Vince asked if he could offer one for them to try. Sure? Why not. They loved it. Mindy was off talking with Aubre’s mother, who was in having dinner and celebrating Mother’s Day.

Ordered a Willowolf next, a double IPA from Seventh Son Brewing. It was superb, too. Before the evening was over I ordered another one of those. Mindy, I think, had a second Hoof Heated Stout. Later, Mindy and I agreed to share the nightly dinner special. Unfortunately, after placing the order we learned that they were out of the special. We opted to share a salad and spinach artichoke dip.

There later than we usually are. It was approaching 11pm before we knew it. Mindy agreed to drive home. Neither one of us were up long at all once home. Quickly off to bed.