I spent this week up to no good. I mislead and then rescued a public transit employee, made elaborate plans with my nutty sister to hoodwink our parents, and unwittingly became a grandma to a rabbit! I can make no cents out of it. This is how it all happened…
Annoyed that I had to do an hour of walking everyday (which obviously does not happen), on Friday I decided that I’ll go to a mall and walk so I can be distracted by window shopping. On the bus on the way back, I noticed that the driver made a stop and was checking something quickly before hurriedly setting off again.
Halfway through, everyone else had disembarked and the driver and I were the only ones on board. For some reason I had a gnawing feeling that something was amiss so instead of getting off the bus like a normal person would, in my mind I was having visions of racing down the streets of Burnaby along the lines of Sandra Bullock in a sadly Keanu-less version of ‘Speed’--I not II.
I was thinking about how fabulous my windswept hair would look in the movie in my head, when the driver told me it was his first day on this route and asked me if he should turn left or go straight. I was taken by surprise, having being bumped out of my reverie that I just said ‘turn, turn’, because we were at the junction and had to make a split second decision.
What that poor man didn’t know was that things like arithmetic, crossing the road, and deciphering left from right are rather challenging for me. In math class I thought an integer was my friend Ravinder’s third cousin twice removed, I invariably look on the wrong side of the road when I’m crossing (by myself), and I always have to take a minute to look at my hands before saying left and right. I am slow that way, but hopefully make up for it in adorability.
I realized that we were indeed in the wrong lane to turn right, as he should have, but considering we were at the junction, he had to go either way. If he went straight, he would be taking another bus’ route. When he turned left, I quickly told him the correct road he had to take and apologized saying when I said to turn, I meant right, not left.
He was ok about it and actually thanked me, saying he had written instructions that were incorrect. Then we took a three point turn, always interesting in a bus, which baffled many passersby and we were on our merry way. Why do these things only happen to me? Of all the buses in all the depots, I pick this one.
In other news, my parents are coming from the motherland. They leave their ‘winter’ clothes at my nutty sister’s house and we were supposed to bring them to Canada this weekend. However, my brilliant spouse, P, changed his mind on our Seattle trip and when I looked through the things they left behind here, I realized they had clothes—if they wish to parade around the greater Vancouver area with no trousers on.
Not wanting to let my parents in on this massive goof up, we made covert plans with my sister to make a quick run to Washington and collect the goods so to speak. However, it seems that between border wait times and kids’ plans, I am not sure how this will go. I am bracing myself to be in lots of trouble! Sometimes I feel like I’m five instead of thirty-five.
The sensible thing to do would be to just tell my parents to pack their pants instead of going through this whole running to another country to fetch luggage shenanigan. My sister would have to drive halfway up the state to meet us mid-way for the ‘drop off’. I guess being practical is not in our DNA. Why didn’t we just bring the stuff down on when we visited two weeks ago?
Any old how, I figured if plans do not work out, I’ll just dangle my four year old, Lanes, in front of them and hope that she will serve as a smoke screen and diffuse the situation. Or I’ll be blogging from Alberta next week because I’ve just evaded the entire sad state of affairs.
Meanwhile, my Lanes has taken to wanting a twin. Her father and I have tried to explain that it’s rather late in the day for that and from time to time she cries saying she is lonely. I think we will have to move out of our crazy a$$ ghetto fabulous building and get a dog (although she says it’s not the same since dogs can’t color or talk). Kids are complicated. When I was four, I would have quickly accepted the dog!
From time to time her favorite toy, the stuffed rabbit Max, is her companion. She came up to me with a mischievous spark in her eyes and said, ‘So Mamma, if I’m Max’s mom, then you are the grandma! So why don’t you feed him and look after him?’. Talk about foreshadowing events!
I quickly said that she should do those things since she is the mom and she ran down the hall gleefully singing ‘sorry, I have to go to work, I’ll pick him up later! Take care of your grandkid!’. With that I had a quick glimpse into my life twenty years from now. So much for my plans on taking a cruise around Greece!
From time to time, to get my goat, Lanes grins and says ‘excuse me Grandma, I mean Mamma!’. At least I know where she gets her naughty sense of humor from. It’s all karma since I have always saved my parents number on my phone under ‘Old Folks’. My rather proper spouse, P, was horrified about this when we first met, but now he has taken to calling them that too!
Other than that excitement, we spent our weekend here doing errands, visiting friends, and preparing for my parents’ arrival. We are to have a whole slew of visitors in April. Around the same time as my parents’, my mom’s friend (and mine—I tend to adopt my mom’s friends) and her husband are coming, and right when they leave, P’s twin and his family are coming for two weeks.
They are coming in exciting times—Canada is scrapping the penny! I hate to break this news to Lanes, who has been ferreting away pennies in her piggy bank—all to buy an ice cream cone. I wanted to go and use them all but I can’t seem to find that plastic blue pig anywhere! I guess when we do find it we will have to use them for arts and crafts!
By the time Lanes grows up, phrases like ‘penny for your thoughts’, or ‘penny wise, pound foolish’ would be meaningless. Oh well, I’ll always be happy to give my two cents—metaphorically: ) Please do leave comments—it gives me a thrill. Yes, I really need to live vicariously through someone.
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