The best support crew ever!

I know I said no more running stuff here, but technically this is about a triathlon, so that's different!  I did my first tri this past weekend, and not only was it amazing, but it had the best. finish. ever.
... because I had the best.  support.  crew.  ever.

Karey and Dave were happily in town this weekend, and while the menfolk were drinking their faces off, we took the kids over to Jamye's and it was just like old times!  Hanging out, wrangling rugrats, and having a good time!  Jamye got the brilliant idea to whip out poster board and markers (because who doesn't have these just lying around the house?!) to get the kids to make signs for me, for my race.  And not ordinary signs, these were FESTIVE!  She referred to one of them as "the Partridge Family sign".

JamyeD couldn't make the race, but the Lamancusas and Woodruffs staked out a corner about 50 yards from the finish line and owned that corner!  I saw the signs before I saw them, but once I did, my face lit up, and I felt a spurt of energy that kept me going all the way to the finish line!  My friend Sarah also made it out before the race even started, and gave me continuous thumbs up while I shivered in line waiting for my turn in the pool.  I couldn't ask for a better family or better friends, which made my first tri the best one I'll probably ever have!

Is this soup organic?

Tonight, for my darling hub's bday, we offered him a dinner at burger mecca, Five Guys.  Having eaten a late lunch (the best-laid plans, laid to waste...) we opted for Jason's instead.
James ordered the hot dog, Sterling got a soup and sandwich, and James got to eyeballing Daddy's soup.  "Why didn't *I* get soup?" he asked.  Sterling sensibly replied, "because you ordered a hot dog... and they don't give you soup when you ask for a hot dog".  We told him that he could have a soup, too, if he finished his hot dog.  ... and it was on like Donkey Kong.  It felt like we were at a hot dog-eating contest, that boy ate that thing so quick!
Sooo... we go up to order him a soup, and it's an automated kiosk, so you have to go through the menu and pick the size, the type, etc.  We were taking too long and let a lady go in front of us, so while we were off to the side, we discussed the options.
"What did Daddy have?"
"Broccoli Cheese.. is that what you want?"
"No, I want something different"
"Like what?"
"I want the organic soup"
"Which one?"
"The organic one."
"James, organic is a type of soup, but it's not a flavor.  What flavor do you want?"
"Organic vegetable soup"
"Are you sure?  Vegetable soup?"
"Organic vegetable soup!"
"James, that's just soup with vegetables in it.. are you sure that's what you want?"
"Oh... no.  I want broccoli cheese, like Daddy had"
and that is what we ordered.  and he ate it all.

Lessons learned the hard way

When Spring rolls around, and the pollen count has dropped considerably, we like to hang out on the back deck, and sometimes we'll open the doors.  That means flies.  A few years ago, we were given a bug zapper that basically looks like a tennis racquet, but with button on the handle that lets you charge it up and zap bugs.  Pretty effectively.
James found out recently that it's also pretty good at zapping children.  It was hanging off the towel bar in our bathroom, and Lord knows why, James likes to hang around right outside of the bathroom door when I am in there.  Ok, I actually know why, it's because he is smitten with Blue, who follows me around closer than my shadow.  So Blue sits outside the door, and James is right there fawning all over him and basically driving him (and me) bananas.
So, I'm sitting in the only room where I *should* be able find peace, when I hear *zap* "OUCH!".  This was followed by, "I learned my lesson... wow, I didn't know that would ZAP me".  I said, "James, it's CALLED a bug ZAPper.. what did you think it did?".  So smart, and yet....

Where babies come from

Today, while James and I were driving around doing some errands, he asked me, "where did I come from?  how did I get here?".  Naturally, I just told him... leaving out a few of the more graphic details.  I explained that there was a seed, and an egg, and that I had different insides, and where the baby comes out, how long it takes to grow.. some pretty basic stuff.  And that was it.
Until this evening, when he asked, out of the blue, "is Daddy going to give you another seed so that you can have another baby?".  "Uh, no, we are quite happy with just one".  "Oh.  What if you had a hundred babies?!" (and of course he's giggling a little at this point, because even he knows that this is ridiculous).  I said, "then I would run a lot more, and I might not come back", to which he replied, almost seriously, "you would leave us??!  Don't you love us??!". 
Who's this "us", and why are you so indignant on behalf of these imaginary siblings?  I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop, when he gets around to asking, "how did the seed get in there?".