Mom took us out to a book fair and an antique tractor show today. Mom wanted to go to the book fair and Charles said he wanted to go to the tractor show. He pestered us about it all morning, checking over and over again “we go to tractors today?”.
Once we got there, however, all Charles wanted to do was ride on the shuttles, which were wagons with chairs pulled by tractors. We did manage to get him down to the steam tractors, but then one blew its whistle and Charles completely freaked out and wanted to get as far away as possible. Later Charles fell victim to our modern consumer culture when we hit the vendor area. Charles wanted some of the toys on display but they were all vintage / collectible (like toy tractors for $130). Charles had a meltdown during which he kept repeating “I want to get something”. Not any particular thing, but just buying something in general. Some chocolate ice cream fixed him up after thirst made him willing to walk over to the food vendors.
Corwin was reasonably well behaved. My favorite bit was when we were waiting for the shuttle back to flee the Evil, Menacing Steam Tractors, I spotted a hail bale and announced that I was going to sit on it. Corwin said “I’ll beat you there and take the seat”. I replied that I had a simple way to get him off and take it back, but Corwin hmmphed at the very thought. Well, as soon as I was there and ready to sit down, I whipped out my camera and pointed it at Corwin. He popped off the bale like he was spring loaded. Like I keep telling the boy, “age and treachery beats youth and skill every time”.
The spawn were so exhausted that all of them fell asleep on the way home.
I also invented a new meaning for an old phrase for Corwin, “penalty shot”. That means he has misbehaved and as punishment, I get to take a picture of him. Here’s today’s penalty shot:
Corwin on the cob