What happened between the Car-Nads and the expletives... (Mostly Wordless Wednesday)

The 35-minute playground trip that cost $49...

Three distinctly different play structures...

Reminiscing on our vacances à Paris eleven months ago.

This one is like a huge Skwish...

We heard a familiar-yet-out-of-context noise...

X could see over the fence...

...a TURKEY!

see the red wattle and blue face?

Boys playing with big sticks...we know where that's headed.

On the 'old skool' play structure...

the very same one I played on when I was 5 years old in 1968.

Example of crap action photo...

totally missing the air shot...

got the landing, though.

I still need to pay that ticket.

Ice Baths, Balls, and the Evil Parking Authority

You know that since this will address the Evil Parking Authority there will be cursing in this post. I am saving it for the end, so if that sort of thing offends you...well, you can stop before we get to it.

These three things named in the title are completely unrelated, one to the other. Hence, they are tangents ...stabbing out into the world from my life. And today is Tuesday. But Triple Tangent Tuesday as a title is so trite. No offense intended if you titled your post thusly today.

First up, the Ice Bath. After Sunday's run, which was my longest run in a few months and doubled my mileage for the month of March even though it was 'only' 6.6 miles, I was feeling pretty thrashed and decided an ice bath was in order. My awesome family had come to retrieve me from my hand-off spot and delivered me to my own vehicle post-haste. (I was lucky enough to get a good walk in between finishing my leg and getting picked up...a nice walk through a questionable part of town but everyone loves a runner wearing a race bib so I encountered nothing but smiles...also lucky for me). My husband hurried home to start an ice bath for me. So thoughtful! The only downside of this was... when the equivalent of a 5-lb bag of ice has been sitting in a tub of cold water for 15 minutes it is WAAYYYY harder to sit your heinie down in the water than if you wait until you're IN the water and THEN add the ice.

See? Major goosebumps...and you can't hear the screeching of bad words...

fortunately, I kept that under my breath...but did say them out loud.

Lesson: always get in before adding the ice!

Next up, the Balls. Why do people do this? We dropped Big G off at his tutor yesterday and this was parked out front of the trendy Berkeley café...

He found this hilarious...that someone would put a ballsack on their car. I found it even more hilarious that they were put on a Volvo station wagon...the absolute ballsiest of cars...not. I especially love how the driver of this Volvo color-coordinated his/her TruckNutz (that is their real name) with the car's exterior...snazzy. And tough. Do you have TruckNutz? What color TruckNutz should I put on my dark grey minivan?

Now for the bit about the Evil Parking Authority...get set... the vile profanity is about to begin...



...are you ready?


Okay.


After the car-nad sighting and dropping G off with his tutor, I decided that the sunshiny day would be perfect for a brief playground outing with the other three kids. We drove a very short distance to a fun park and parked the car here...

view from driver seat...

street sweeping schedule signage peeking out from behind telephone pole...

the identical sign just behind my car (out of view) stated that this was NOT street sweeping day.

We walked across the street to the play structures and had a blast for about 35 minutes. Then it was time to head back to the car. Upon arriving at the car, I noticed a white envelope tucked under my windshield wiper. Yes, a f*cking parking ticket. Issued five minutes before we returned to the car. Nice. I couldn't for the life of me figure out the statement in the 'reason' section...something about 2-hour zone and permit only...we had only been there for 35 minutes! And the resident permit parking areas allow non-permitted vehicles to park for 2 hours...in most places. So then I start walking up and down the street trying to figure this bullsh*t out....truly baffled... and I see this ONE f*cking sign...

...a single, lone sign and it had been neatly obscured from my view by that telephone pole. 

Probably the only BLOCK in Berkeley that has this sign on it...f*ckers.

The City of Berkeley is notorious for overly vigilant, borderline vicious parking officers. The sit near meters that are ticking down and start writing tickets as the driver is climbing into the car. They will watch a driver park in a weirdly signed, ticketable spot and not say a thing...eager to write that ticket and reach their quota. It has created an incredibly hostile parking environment. There are warnings posted on meters and on the officers' vehicles declaring that assault on a parking enforcement officer is a crime and will be punished to the fullest extent of the law. People want to seriously hurt these guys.

Anyway... so I got my ticket, found out why, got in the car, and what was running through my mind? Stupid mutherf*cker assh*le cocks*cker d*ckwad f*ckface b*tches...seriously...what.the.f*ck? Then I realized...my bad. Not healthy to get so f*cking worked up over a missed sign. There was a sign. That officer was just doing his/her job. It was not personal. It was just business. And I broke the rules. Once I was done being angry about the situation, I just felt stupid. I really didn't want to pay $49 for 35 minutes in the park. That's my set of chrome TruckNutz right there.

I wanna go to the playground...

...the one with the swings...

...and some slides...

...and climb-y things for you to climb on...

...and boing-y things...

...and sand...

But what mommy wants to know is...

Why in the heck do they put these stupid things in the play structures under the guise of 'musical instrument'?

The cacophony emanating from these when banged on is atrocious.

And there is always some kid who loves to bang on them.

Jardin du Luxembourg, Part Deux

Spending Sunday afternoon at the Jardin du Luxembourg wasn't enough. And we didn't have Baby X with us. The boys wanted to go back, and they wanted to share the experience with her. So we had to do it again... even though we only had one day left ... noooooooooooo...

Riding the Métro with four kids is an experience, to say the least. You never know how it's going to fill up...

grab the stroller and the kid standing on the seat...

look how it fills up...

there are signs requesting that you stand when things get crowded... the seats flip up and allow more space...

and then it's packed.

But the ride doesn't last forever...

Finally, you get off the train and go above ground...

And walking the tree-lined paths through the park is joyous...

a visual delight for art lovers...

as well as tree lovers!

Though it was a Monday, in the perfect weather there were so many people sitting in the park's chairs, relaxing and enjoying the beauty.

Or playing a game of boules.

We headed to the playground. Remember how I said that French playgrounds are cooler? I showed you a bit of that in Part Un... here's some more... yes, this is that same playground. It is huge and wildly popular... and you have to pay to get in :(  but it is totally worth it.

This time, the older kids decided to try the awesome swing contraption!

You can see Big G in the yellow shirt seated on the swing's seat. The rope is attached to a wheel on a track. You leap off a platform, jump onto the swing and whip around the oval overhead track.

Awesome!

Some of the ropes have the "button" lower and you can stand on it... like Baby X in the turquoise shirt is doing in the above picture.

Q-Man is finishing up the ride, almost back at the platform after whizzing around the track.

They were in heaven :)

I tried to find a better shot of the rope Eiffel Tower climbing structure...

Here Q-Man sits atop the train's smoke stack... this train had three 'cars' and was very popular.

The sand pit was incredible.

That tower-ish thing in the foreground had ropes and pulleys with buckets attached for hauling things up and down. 

The 'big kid' area was huge... my kids were all over the place and it was hard to get pictures of them in the tunnels, on the slides, or going up the ladders.

Then Miss C did a face plant ...

and it was time to go!

As we headed back to the house, we took in all the street art... it is everywhere and in so many forms...

Fountains...

Mosaic wall art...

Colorful window displays of swimsuits!

No matter where you look, creativity abounds.

Even the warning signs are more interesting than ours.

Up next...

Père Lachaise Cemetery. I think that'll be our final stop.

I know, this is getting to be like that slideshow your neighbor shares with you... never-ending... ever...

Wonderful Day-Trip to Soissons

Soissons is a town of roughly 30,000. It is one of the oldest towns in northern France and dates back to before the 3rd century. For a long time it was even the capital its own kingdom. Lots of history in this town. I have included this link if you want to find out more. It was run roughshod over for millennia, very notably in the last century when it was on the front line during World War I and again saw action during World War II.

My husband reconnected with someone from his childhood who currently lives in Soissons. She is a lovely person and an amazing hostess, and she shared this interesting and beautiful town with us.

We spent the better part of the day just walking around and talking. It was one of the highlights of the trip. Those spectacular Parisian 'attractions' are amazing, but connecting one-on-one with someone and really seeing something from a more personal perspective really make the trips for me.

After a bite to eat, we headed to the local playground and park where everyone had a great time.

Head first down the slide... is there any other way? Miss C doesn't think so.

For a teeny playground in a teeny town, the collection of trees was incredible. There were over 20 different types of trees... this did not include the shrubs... in a planted area about the size of a smallish city block. Tulip poplars, larch, douglas fir-ish ones, weeping willow, copper beech, weeping beech, chestnut, cherry, ginkgo, norfolk island pine-ish one, some species of 'regular' pine, variegated holly, a couple of species of maple, a couple species of oak... it was like a mini arboretum. My horticultural education was screaming with excitement! (yes, that was my major in college... don't make fun of me).

We couldn't have picked a more lovely and perfect time to take this trip. Everything was blooming and green. The temperatures were perfect for walking around and being outside.

Here, Daddy made the flowering cherry "snow" on the kids...

We then went for a walk through town and wound up on the banks of the Aisne River.

The swans on the Aisne can apparently be quite aggressive. The kids were enchanted and, fortunately, did not fall victim to any swan-assault. The kids did, however, assault each other... or their chuthers ;-)...  because they each wanted to touch a swan but kept freaking the poor birds out. Every time one of the swans would swim up pretty close to one of the kids, a sibling would come charging over to try and touch it, too, which pissed off the first kid who would then scream at the second kid who would still not back away which necessitated a getting punched. Yay. During the melées, the swans would swim away... of course.

This is the historic cathedral in Soissons. I encourage you to click the link to learn more. It is very rich in history, and there is too much to say for me to write it all over again :)

The cathedral was halfway between the vicious swans and this abbey.

L'Abbaye Saint-Jean-des-Vignes is in ruins and has been for over 200 years. Again, I encourage you to click the link here to read more about it. It isn't a long blurb, but it is a bit much for me to try and summarize.

You can see it was a lovely day!

Above, Baby X is making shadow puppets on the lawn...

And below, the kids are finally frolicking ... amongst the ruins of a medieval abbey.

As my husband often says...

It doesn't get any better than this!