Sunday, August 17, 2008

Moth Moon and Busted Water Bottles

Sammy and I completed our 4th Canoe While The Moon is Full program through Hennepin Parks. Yesterday was the "Moth Moon."

Sammy and I are starting to feel like old timers when we're doing this. Sammy sits in the back (stern) and tells me what to do. She steers and I'm the motor. We only ran into someone once or twice (due to no fault of our own). We practiced turning in circles: one paddles forward and the other paddles backward.

It was a beautiful still night and a gorgeous sunset. The moonrise was semi-obscured by a cloud deck, but looked beautiful and ghostly. We saw some cranes flying low over the lake and a large V of Canadian Geese flew directly over us in the twilight.

Afterward, as we were bringing our canoes to the trailer, I lost Sammy for a moment. When I found her, I saw that she had taken it upon herself to volunteer and help with collecting and hanging up the lifevests. She then took the mini-flashlight I had given her and was helping others see. She's always a helper; I'm very proud of my young lady.

Speaking of which, we have the busy end of August goings-on. Wednesday is our Anniversary (14 years) and a week from Wednesday is Sammy's birthday. We're having her party a week from today, so today is a preliminary cleaning day, based upon the theory that next weekend we will have to clean less. (The formula is f(cleaning early)x1/f(next week), I believe. However, one must account for the Stella Effect (SE), which is a well documented undoing of work that has been undone - this can be tempered by the throwing of everything into something with a door on it, and closing the door (DC):

f(CE)x1/f(NW)xSE/DC

Something like that.

Oh, back to the Moth Moon: Sammy will be disappointed if I don't mention this, as this was the high point for her in the evening:

After we finished canoeing, we went to the gas station for a snack. I picked up a bottle of water and was holding it by the cap walking with Sammy. It slipped out of my hand, and crashed on the floor. The cap completely broke off and the bottle rolled under the ice cream freezer, from which Sammy was getting a ChocoTaco. Mortified, I retrieved the bottle and apologized to the cashier and told them I'd pay for it. He shook his head and said, "No. That bottle was defective," which was pretty nice. I asked for paper towels to clean up my mess and they happened to have the floor zamboni out and said, "Nah, that's okay." I sheepishly crept back to the cooler and selected another bottle and cradled it up to the counter verrrry carefully.

So: and hour and half of canoeing with her mom on a gorgeous summer evening and dollars to donuts, it will be remembered as Hey, Mom: Remember The Time You Busted A Water Bottle at Holiday?