Proud to be and other stories

Henry is obsessed with American flags. This child gets so worked up excited when we pass the new Burger King and it’s got FIVE! AMERICAN! FLAGS! On top! Anytime we are driving anywhere he picks out the American Flags. It’s pretty funny and darn cute. I passed the Shriners lodge the other day and they were having one of those gatherings where they all stand out on the street waving American flags, and I swear if traffic hadn’t been so wretched and I hadn’t forgotten my phone at work, I would have driven him back by after picking him up at daycare.

The other day we were in the turn lane, and the SUV next to us was decked out in one of those paint wrapping advertisements, and it was a flag. The boys were beside themselves. “Look at THAT!”

Then Spencer: “He must really love America.”

Folks, it was an a/c business. Apparently the marketing kitsch works, at least on the under-seven crowd.

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My fitbit decided to poop out on me. It took four in six month to get one that consistently worked (this is not generally an issue, from what I can tell, just my own bad luck). This one lasted a full six months, and I don’t know why it stopped holding a charge but it’s grating on my nerves. Thankfully they do have excellent customer service, so once they go through all the troubleshooting emails with me (I know all the troubleshooting tricks and try to let them know, but that’s what help desks are for – confirming people are trying everything first) I should be able to get a replacement. In the meantime I’m dealing with it.

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And speaking of Fitbits, C has decided to get one too, and also to sign up for My Fitness Pal so he too can track his food. This is great! But also annoying, because then he makes all these arbitrary rules on himself, like staying under 100 for carbs, but yet I’m the one cooking all the meals so now I’m going to have to abide by his arbitrary rules. Last night I made pizza pockets from the TJs garlic and herb pizza dough and filled them with veggies and a little feta and they were delicious and fairly low calorie, but they were made from pizza dough so obviously the carbs were high.

Now that C is tracking his steps too, he has started us on family walks. Family exercise! Important! We went on a walk last night and it was great except the kids complained a lot and there was a lot of forcing them to stop and look for cars and all of that. Pointing out American flags on the houses. Maybe we can hike sometimes soon.

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I have this hacking cough that I get mostly at night, but it’s pretty distracting. I can’t be on the south side of the house when the kids are falling asleep because it keeps them up. I have trouble reading to Henry without croaking out the last 2/3 of the book. Water, honey, cough syrup – none of it really makes much of a dent. 21 days, right? I think that’s what the common length of a cough is with or without medicine. Thankfully it doesn’t keep me awake so sometimes I just feel like I need to go to sleep to get relief from it. Anyhow, earlier this week I was coughing in the office while C messed around on Reddit, and this exchange happened:

C: Please don’t die, I need you.

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…

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I can’t cook for shit.

So there’s that.

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We were going to see Paul McCartney at the end of the month, but he rescheduled all of his June dates, so now we’re just going 3 hours north to stay in a hotel that we can’t get reimbursed and have an overnight date night. Anyone know anything we can do in Jacksonville, or a good restaurant we should try while we’re there?

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I was looking through my phone for a specific picture, and found this:

Why on earth did my husband take a picture of his foot with my phone?