So basically, the rest of the week, after Brandon's episodes of sexual harassment that I outlined in my previous blog post (is that even what it's called?), was relatively uneventful. It was awesome to see the family and friends, and sucky not to have time to see the ones that, well, I didn't have time to see. Nate and I got to sleep in for 6 days, and had a nanny (my mom) as well. I think I only changed about 3 diapers and only wiped a kid's butt once - in an entire week. That's what I'm talking about! Usually that encompasses one morning for me.
The downfall to the week was: having someone else basically taking care of our kids only served to remind Nate and I of all we'd rather be doing at any given moment of any given day than playing servant to little kids. So therefore, my goal of being wealthy enough to hire a live-in nanny has been renewed with the utmost passion. It's not that I don't enjoy taking care of my kids, I just don't enjoy doing it every hour of every day. The whole parenting thing would be so much easier if I only had to deal with my kids for no more than an hour or two every day. Absence definitely makes the heart grow fonder, versus the overexposure I get. So McDonalds, here I come for an application, and yes, I will work 10-hour shifts, seven days a week. Hire me.
But I've made my bed and now I have to lie in it (I just hope I don't get pregnant in the process of doing that) and back to the trip recap I go. On Sunday we left our cozy dreamy cloud of significantly reduced parental responsibilities and embarked on the journey back home. The drive was not fun, as to be expected, but nothing too horrible happened so I'm thankful for that. One crazy chick in a yellow van decided to freak out on me for absolutely no reason (seriously, NO reason!) as I came up beside her in the left lane of I-5 while she was in the right lane. But my superb ability to handle freaks (I've mentioned that I used to work in a jail - plus, I live with 3 small children) allowed me to expertly deal with the situation and before long, she apparently got bored with being a psycho and the situation was over.
The first stop we made (again not until after 4 hours of travel, amazing!) was awesome in that the younger 2 took craps at that time and I am eternally grateful for their excellent timing. However, literally 15 minutes after hitting the road, and a mere 5 minutes after passing the last town and therefore the last bathroom for the next 75 miles, #1 announced that he had to go #2. Fantastic. We had just passed Ashland, heading south, and anyone who knows the geography knows that we were entering no man's land, i.e., no bathroom land. We drove forever before finally coming to an exit, which we took and then drove and drove some more, only to find trees and hills and zero signs of civilization, much less a toilet. We headed higher into the hills, and I'm having creepy thoughts about that family a few years ago that got lost driving from Oregon to San Francisco and lived in their car for 9 days after getting stuck in the snow, with the dad dying before they were found. I was mentally calculating how much food and water we had and reviewing my limited wilderness survival skills (in other words, completely and totally overreacting) when Nate decided that we're screwed on the bathroom/civilization end and turned around. Of course, Ethan could have crapped in the woods somewhere, but the situation hadn't reached critical mass and until it did, I wasn't going to exercise that option. So ten wasted minutes later, we got back on the freeway with a little brown snake still playing peek-a-boo with Ethan's butthole.
I don't know or even care anymore how much farther we drove before Nate spotted a gas station in the middle of nowhere and Ethan took care of his business. Off we went again, set back only about a half an hour at this point but whatever. Perhaps that half hour allowed us to miss the cop that was sitting on the road, not that we were speeding. Again, Brandon only slept about 30 minutes during the entire drive, (thanks dude) and cried for significantly longer. But, we were heading for home sweet home and knowing that we are not going to have to do this again for a while somehow bolstered my ability to be unfazed by him.
Twelve hours after leaving my dad's driveway, we pulled into our own. I collapsed into bed later that night and slept so hard that when Connor woke up crying from another bad dream I didn't even hear him or wake up until Nate left the bed to go deal with him. I was so out of it that I began wondering why Nate was leaving our picnic and whose kid was crying... wtf? The next day we awoke to reality and the feeling of gratitude that we are not traveling again for a long time.
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