Unexplored Territory

Monday, May 22, 2006

Ah yes... summer in my hometown

The pool has water in it. They were putting the lines up this afternoon as we drove by. They were testing out the new water play area that was just installed over the winter.

The birds are chirping, the squirrels are eating the helicopters out of our eavespouts, and the wasps are trying in vain to make nests in our umbrella out in the backyard, but their efforts are thwarted every time I scream for Ace to come out and work his magic.

The grass is green and the playgrounds are filling to capacity.

And everywhere you turn, they have either graded down a street, leaving the sewer lids and gas lids exposed, marking them with their fluorescent pink spray, or they are doing the hometown version of "patching" the streets by filling in the cracks with that nasty asphalt in a hose stuff. Or they are driving directly in front of me with that street cleaner thing right after I have run my van through the carwash.

It is inevitable. For with spring and summer come the city work projects.

You know the ones. The ones where you are just flabbergasted that:

there are THAT many men employed with the city department;
there are barely any women at these scenes; if there are, they are wearing Daisy Dukes, sipping French Vanilla Cappucino out of their Speedway styrofoam coffee cups, and sporting a tan that would make George Hamilton jealous;
it takes 20 men to fill in one crack in the street; the others have to stand around with their hardhats on, pointing at random things across the street, even though those random *things* are the new cars parked in the dealership's parking lot *it looks SO official*;
ANYone could look like they know what they are doing if they sported a hardhat, a fluorescent yellow vest, and steel toed shoes, just as long as they are carrying a surveying instrument;
there is THAT much money in this town to be having SO many road projects going on at the same time.

Last year, our whole street and curbs were replaced. Taken out and filled back in. It was rather a fun summer. The kids had something to look at whenever they were in front of our house, and the Door Man made a lot of friends. He told one road crew that he loved them. He falls in and out of love so quickly, fickle boy that he is.

So this year, someone else gets to enjoy the fact that the road crew WILL take their lunchbreaks in your driveway and hold up your child's bus for a few minutes while they make a feeble attempt to get out of the way.

The sweet smell of asphalt and the pitter patter of jackhammers .... summer could be no sweeter.

1 Comments:

Anonymous said...: Daisy dukes and styrofoam capp. cups..ha ha ha. mere, you are so funny! So true though, so true! I think I want that part time summer job. I noticed the roads yesterday as well and I thought good god, here we go again. How about those new (retarded) slides at the pool? What the? Do you guys want to ride together on Sunday? Are you still kid free? Christie wanted us to bring them and I'm like "no way, want to relax, enjoy myself, not worry about who is where and what they are getting into". I know you feel the same way.
She wants to know if she can call Patrick Ace.. ha ha. Can't wait to hang out with y'all.; 7:44 AM

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I'm a mom of three peeps ... Queen Bee, The Door Man, and the Chandelier Monkey, and wife to Ace, the Helpful Hardware Man. I created this space to get away from the people known as my inlaws, and because life with three kids and a hubby is all Unexplored Territory.

The nine-year-old who seems to be growing older every minute, has an opinion and a comment for everything, and has a true servant's heart.

The seven-year-old who loves the organization of things, will someday be someone's therapist because of his kind soul, and will more than likely be living with us until he is 40 years old.

The five-year-old with the 13-year-old attitude, who has a dictator's personality, asks you to watch her all the time and say "hold on" to keep your attention, and will someday come home on the back of some dude's motorcycle with 10 tatts and a body piercing or two.

The man of the house, the fixer of things, the winner of prizes, and the only person in his family to escape the South.