Boys Away!

Both of the boys were away last night, William at an overnight birthday party and Daniel at a cold-weather camping trip with the Scouts. It should have been a romantic evening for two at the Brooks house, but naturally Karen and I both have colds.

Nothing major, in fact mostly going away already, but it did put a crimp on the evening, which consisted mostly of sitting and watching TV and going to bed fairly early. But it was nice to have the quiet house in the morning.

William stayed at the Windrifter with his friend Matt and a couple of other boys, where they got to swim in the pool, play video games together, and watch movies until fairly late at night. Danny, on the other hand, got to sleep in a cold tent and change his socks three times because they kept getting wet. But he had a good time anyway.

The campout was supposed to be near one of the local ski areas, in a place that's less than four miles from our house in a straight line, but more than 15 miles away by any drivable road. But we got a bit more snow and colder temperatures than had been predicted when the event had been planned, so the troop moved to one of the leader's homes.

Unfortunately, the email telling me that got caught in my spam filter, and I ended up driving around trying to figure out what was going on. Fortunately, the Scout leaders had also sent Karen and email, and I was able to get the information from that. Made for an exhausting morning.

Today, after we picked up Danny at camp, we went over the the Windrifter so that Danny could get a chance to swim, too, in the nice warm water in the nice warm pool house, with a nice hot shower and a good meal afterward.

It was definitely the perfect ending to the trip.

The Brooks Bunch, Unplugged

Today was Karen's day off. We slept in (well, sort of; I got up to make sure the boys were ready for school, and then I went back to bed), and we did some sorting through the clutter that had accumulated in the kitchen drawers. When William came home, he and Karen did some baking, after which William was supposed to make dinner. And just as he was setting up to do that, the power went off.

We hadn't had anything more than a light snow until then, but right around 5:00, the wind started to pick up. It must have knocked down a tree limb onto a power line. Sigh.

So, off to Wolfeboro for pizza, and to hang out in the library for some relaxation and light until they closed at 8:00. Lucky for us, the power was back on by the time. But it did put kind of a crimp in the evening. And it had us worried, because we hadn't prepared for it.

The wind is expected to continue through tomorrow, so I set us up with flashlights and extra water, just in case. And least I don't have to worry about the morning alarm not going off, because that's on my phone. If the boys' alarms fail, I have a backup.

Which makes me sleep better, even if it annoys the boys.