Sad to say, despite some cool stuff this weekend, I’m having one of those down periods. We’ll just say that yesterday, for all kinds of reasons, just wasn’t optimal, and I was, frankly, relieved to go to bed and put it death, at least figuratively.

That said, I still did some objectively cool and interesting stuff this weekend, and I’m going to try to focus on those things.

My weekend actually began on Wednesday night, as I took Thursday off to surprise the eldest at the school’s end-of-year awards ceremony, where she received up an academic award in science, which, you know is all kinds of cool. I’m proud of the kid, especially about the fact that she’s learned a lot of really important life lessons a whole lot earlier than I figured them out, and is probably setting herself up for greater success than I ever had, which, really, is what you want when you’re a parent. I’d like to say that I could claim at least a little bit of credit for how well she’s doing, but I know better than to do so.

Anyway, word came down that this award thing was going down about an hour after the casual “hey, guys, how about a couple of us go to a ball game?” plans for Wednesday became a thing, with the boss and various other people beyond the initial ad-hoc group attending. So, I ended up staying in DC a bit later than usual to attend the game and be a courteous member of the office team (and figured I’d be able to dodge some rush hour traffic in the process). I did end up seeing perhaps the best played game in Nationals history (seriously, 10-0? Will never happen again), but ended up hitting two of those floating islands of nighttime interstate construction and crawled into my bed around 2am after being awake for only slightly less than twenty-two hours straight.

That really sucked.

So, Thursday. Award business went of without a hitch. clap, clap, proud, etc. Rest of the day a blur. I was very, very tired. Though had some fun playing board games with friends that evening. Still stayed up too late.

Friday. Last day of school. Spent the morning baking on elementary school paved playground watching the annual “Dance, Monkey, Dance!” display put on by the kids. Middle child wore a toga. To dance to “Sweet Home Alabama.” I don’t get it either. Don’t think too hard about it, you’ll just hurt yourself like I did. Rest of the day involved cracking the whip on the kids to clean up the house before Saturday’s birthday party.

Saturday. Spent the morning “practicing amateur archeology” with some friends along a stretch of adopted highway. Felt good doing soemthing good for the environment that was immediately apparent and obvious. Also, saved a turtle. Afternoon? Lots of little girls in my house. Not a bad time; they’re generally good kids. Eldest’s younger siblings don’t integrate terribly well with the group, and eldest doesn’t have much interest in facilitating said integration. Some chaos ensues, but an overall success. The house is still standing. Kids leave, there’s a huge brown chocolate stain on my living room carpet near where the rock band drums were set up. Gah. Discovered the strange surreal majesty of “Yo Gabba Gabba!” How have I missed this?

Yes, it’s true, this post is starting to look like Rorshach’s journal. Hrrm.

Sunday. Day trip. New American Girl store in DC metropolitan area is very, very pink. Worth a trip if you have a little girl you want to impress. Most successful part of the day. Otherwise, the less said about the day, the better.

So, the last couple of days, edited for content. Ready to move on now.