Jay’s back finally started to feel better after a few days.
Tuesday and Wednesday, Xena and Babalouie stayed with us. We had so much fun! I took them to the Falls and we played at the playground where Xena demonstrated her awesome monkey bars abilities. Babalouie is working on his self-propulsion on the swings. Then we headed down the long stairs to see the falls from below. It was very hot, so they were happy to take off their shoes and socks and wade in the pool below the first bridge. When the two of them had wandered around as much as they wanted to, we went and visited Grandpa. We found him and Grandma in the courtyard, which has a strange knack of drawing every breeze possible, even on a hot, still day.
They both collapsed into bed and slept for ten straight hours. So did I. Jay didn’t; his back injury made lying down very uncomfortable.
Thursday, I got a little bit of work done before heading out to run errands and see my Dad before I drove up to Katie’s to spend a few hours with BoopityBoop. It was another extremely hot day; upper 80s, low 90s with high humidity. Jay had invited a couple pals over for cigars and dinner in the backyard. He got home at 3:00 to find our backyard a complete mess. The grass was filled with tree branches and long saws and our two maple tree had been…well, raped is probably too strong a word. Let’s just say they looked like Ragnar Lothbrok’s army had won a battle in their branches.
Jay has spent the last six weeks working and worrying over ever flower and blade of grass in the back yard. He reacted the way most homeowners would if they came home one day to find their trees taken apart and the branches spread all over the grass. He reacted like a guy who had been in constant pain and hadn’t slept in days. He called the police.
Before the cops showed up, the tree trimmers finished their break. They explained that they were trimming all the trees on the street that interfered with the powerlines. They showed Jay that they hadn’t damaged the trees at all and in fact, the trees would actually be even more beautiful next summer for having been pruned properly.
He apologized for overreacting and they cleaned up the mess they’d made before going on their break.
Several hours later, while he and his friends were enjoying their whiskey and cigars on the deck, a Minneapolis Police Officer joined them. Jay explained the misunderstanding, everyone laughed, the cop declined to join them for a bump and complimented Jay on our lovely back yard before continuing on his way.
I missed all that drama and excitement but had a perfectly grand time with the twins.
It was extremely hot and sticky when I got to their house but the girls still wanted to run around in the back yard, so that’s what we did. They’ve learned that it’s just as much fun to push their little pink convertibles around as to be pushed in them. It’s just a matter of time before they push each other around in them, which will be really fun. Boopity spent several minutes trying to put on a pair of sunglasses she found in the trunk of her car. She knew they somehow fit on her face, over her eyes but she couldn’t figure out how they stayed on. She finally just hung them around her neck and wore them like a bowtie.
Boop tried to take a large stick away from the dog. When the pup wouldn’t give it up, she picked up her own stick, pointed it at the dog and said “pew pew pew!” A huntress is born!
Katie got home, we fed the girls dinner and got them into their new, summer pajamas.
I remember being little and getting summer pajamas from the Sears Catalogue. We knew it was really summer when we got to switch from our winter nighties to our summer jammies!
BoopityBoop had their 18month checkup. They’re completely healthy and strong and obviously smarter than your average toddler. The doctor said he wouldn’t mind if they fattened up a bit, which is worth a try but they already eat like linebackers. It’s not like we can stop them from running around like little hurricanes between meals. They burn a lot of calories and sleep like teenagers.
Friday was the hottest day yet. It got up into triple digits and the humidity was horrible. My plan for the day was to hide in my air conditioned office and get some work done before my jam packed weekend began. It was a great plan and it lasted right up until the moment Katie, Josie and BoopityBoop walked in the back door.
Like I was going to stay up in my office while they were having a pool party on the deck!
And then it was BUFFETT DAY!
Yes, Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Reefer Band was playing at Target Field on Saturday. Oh, the Eagles were following him but no one I knew cared that much. Yeah, yeah, the Eagles are great but they’re not a State of Mind and Being. Take it Easy is a nice little bumper sticker but lacks the philosophical punch of any line in A Cowboy in the Jungle.
“ roll with the punches, play out all your hunches, make the best of whatever comes your way.
‘Cause twenty four hours or sixty good years, it’s not that long a stay.”
I’m not saying the Eagles aren’t great; of course they are but if you’d rather go to Hotel California than Margaritaville, I don’t know what to say to you. Clearly, you don’t listen to lyrics.
I started the day running over to my folks house. My Dad had another day trip home and I didn’t want to miss it. It wasn’t a full-blown party like his Father’s Day visit had been but it was fun; Woody, Bill, Joe, Vince, Katie and I joined Mom and Dad at the dining room table. When I left, Dad was enjoying a root beer float (his all time favorite) without anyone’s help.
I got back to our house to find that the Parrothead Party had begun! Jay’s sister Patty is a Parrothead and all her girls are Parakeets.* Her daughter Julie was in town for the weekend and they all dropped by for a pre-pre-party dance and shout out.
The pre-party was taking place at Josie’s. The plan was barbecue and drinks in her backyard, then Uber to the ball park for the concert. The party, which included lots of Josie’s friends (I think it was somebody’s birthday, as well?) began around noon. Jay and I had no intention of going so early but Zack left the house, cooler in hand, around one.
We picked up a slab and a half slab of ribs from Famous Dave’s shortly after three and joined the party.
Josie lives in a wonderful old Victorian four-plex in Uptown. The yard is shady and overgrown and perfectly delightful. We were following her down the narrow, jungle like sidewalk around the building to the back yard when I felt a sharp pain in my foot. I yelped, picked up my foot and saw that a nail had gone right through the sole of my sandal and pierced the base of my big toe!
Aargh! How am I supposed to dance all night with a hole in my foot?? Is the thought that went through my head. So much for my super power of having impervious feet!
I yanked out the nail, limped into the house and Josie brought me a bowl full of warm, soapy water. After I’d soaked the foot for a few minutes, I realized it didn’t hurt anymore. Jay, who was very solicitous throughout, picked up my foot and attempted to make it bleed a lot, to clean out the wound.
“It won’t bleed.” He said, worried. “That’s not good.”
“It doesn’t hurt,” I said. “That’s good.”
“It doesn’t?” He continued to try to get blood out of my stone feet.
“Not at all.” I took my foot from him and looked at the point where the nail had poked me. Nothing. Oh, Okay; a teensy, tiny little scratch, where the tip of the nail had managed to scrape a microscopic bit of callous away. Had it even penetrated the skin? I swiped my sandal with a napkin to see if there was any blood at all. Yep, it had bled for an instant but my feet had once again proved impervious to harm!
Super powers intact!
From that moment on, the plan went smoothly: we ate ribs, drank a beer, sang a song and caught an Uber down to the ballpark.
You could tell exactly who in the huge crowd was there for Buffett: the Parrotheads were dressed in Hawaiian colors, leis and costumes. We saw guys dressed as Carmen Miranda and girls dressed as Cheeseburgers (in paradise). We saw sharks, fins and boat drinks.
Jimmy Buffett and the Eagles may seem a strange pairing but the two actually have a long, happy history together. Buffett used to open for them decades back when they were all new and shiny. Jimmy and original Eagle Glenn Frey had been neighbors and actually wrote Gypsies in the Palace together (Glenn can be heard at the end of the song). When the Eagles broke up, Timothy B. Schmidt had joined the Coral Reefer Band for a few years and according to one legend, coined the term “Parrothead”. So the Eagles and Buffet are family.
The forecast had been for hot, sticky and rainy. It did not rain. We didn’t mind the heat or humidity; it seemed appropriate, in fact.
Our tickets took up nearly the entire second row of our tier and we had clear sight lines to the stage. The show was fantastic! The predicted rain continued to hold off as the sun went down, the lights of downtown came on all around us and the Eagles took the stage.
Ron, who was sitting next to me, at this point (we’d shuffled our seating repeatedly throughout the show) is a yuuuge Eagles fan and a font of useful information as the night went on. I think I’d seen at some point in time that Vince Gill was touring with the Eagles, but I’d forgotten. He’s also lost a ton of weight so I didn’t recognize him at first, but Ron reminded me that it was him. I love Vince Gill! He’s the reason I started listening to Country music back in the early 90s, not Garth Brooks, who got everyone else listening. I loved Garth too but it was Vince who hooked me. Vince did his hit Slippin’ Away in the middle of the set. Backed by the Eagles, it was absolutely fabulous.
So, I got three concerts for the price of one!
Josie, who is only 22, didn’t know the Eagles from the Ruttles. She thought Glenn Frey’s son Deacon was hot but wasn’t particularly moved by the songs. I told her that all these songs had been huge hits while I was in high school and I hadn’t even realized they were all by the same band, because the Eagles had so many singers and were so stylishly versatile. After a particularly beautiful ballad, she turned to me and said “well, that was boring as shit.” Philistine!
A handful of our parakeets slipped out after a half dozen Eagle’s songs. They preferred to skip Hotel California and remain in Margaritaville but for those of us who stayed, the Eagles got better and better as the night progressed. That bunch of 70 year olds ripped the night apart with their guitars.
It was all good but four hours sitting in the stands of Target Field in 90 degree heat is a lot for a decrepit oldster like myself. My knees were throbbing by 8:00.. Jay stood and danced as much to ease his aching back as being moved by the music. During one of the last numbers, a laser show accompanied the music and when the lights hit our tier, I closed my eyes…and woke up twenty seconds later.
Man, you know you’re old when you doze off at a rock show.
As a good friend said the other night “Getting old…f***.”
When the show was over, Jay, Patty, Jenna and I floated along with the crowd out of the ball park and through downtown to a bar with an empty table. We grabbed something to drink and waited until the initial concert crowd had cleared a bit before calling an Uber to pick us up.
Home by 12:30 to dream of the Jolly Mon and one particular harbor…
I did remember to get a tetanus shot at the minute clinic Sunday morning; No lockjaw for me!
We had another party to go to on Sunday. Will the fun never end?
*A second or third generation Parrothead. One who was raised in Margaritaville, which is not a place but a state of mind. My kids are Parakeets who have all grown into full blown Parrotheads.