Reading: I'm about half way through Ladder of Years. I think this is my third time through for this novel. I see something new in it each time I read it.

Background courtesy of
Ace of Space

Hectic Morning

This morning was one of those busy mornings. After dropping Daniel off at his day camp, the twins and I drove to the Press to hand in a table that I forgot to include with the sample pages I turned in last week. Stephen and Matthew were captivated by the sight of a half dozen tiger swallowtail butterflies flitting about a flowering bush outside the Press. We stood there and watched them, while I told the boys that this was how the butterflies eat.

Then we stopped at Sam's to pick up cat litter. With three indoor cats, we go through a 40-pound bag of cat litter every other week. Next we were off to Target to pick up a few things for our trip to Maine: pull-ups for the twins to sleep in and a spill-proof bottle for blowing bubbles. Mom can't find spill-proof bottles up there, and she wants one to give to my nephew.

Finally we went to Wegmans. By then it was 11:30, so I decided to check out the food court for lunch, but the twins just wanted to play in the play area. After signing them in, I bought a slice of pizza from the pizza counter and went in search of a place to sit. It wasn't too crowded yet, but I wanted to explore so I wandered upstairs. The pizza was pretty good; but even better was just having a few minutes to myself in the middle of the day to eat quietly and hear myself think, particularly after all the running around we'd been doing.

When one of the twins hurts himself after his latest bit of daredevilry, my usual refrain is "Well, what do you expect? If you're going to jump on the furniture with your eyes closed, no less, what do you expect?" I am not exactly a model of sympathy at these times.

Today in the car, Stephen got in trouble for throwing a toy. I yelled at him, and he responded by repeating what he's heard me say so many times, "Well, what do you expect?"

"I expect you boys to behave yourselves in the car, " I answered. "Obviously, I expect too much."

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