holiday sales
today i took the day off because cam's work christmas party was tonight and i didn't want to go. (if i had gone to work, i would have been waiting there for him until after 11 pm to pick me up or i would have had to ask my poor nervous-driving-downtown mother to get me during rush hour.) am taking tomorrow off, too, since cam will be working at home and i love him so.
cam woke me up before he left this morning. unfortunately, paul woke up, too, and refused to let me go back to bed. first morning of a four-day weekend and i'm out of bed before 6:30. i recorded my out-of-office extended absence greeting for my work voicemail, which delighted paul. "me!" he insisted, and pretended to hold a phone to his ear. i recorded him saying "dad" and he made me play it for him over and over again. later that morning, i called my mom over and we chatted while paul and i ate "brown" (hash browns). he pretended to cook, stirring cooked potatoes in a small pot. it came out that she wanted to go to citadel, a local outlet mall, because she wanted to buy new plates. she had remembered me talking about a store that sold open stock correlle and she was interested. (interesting note: years ago, she told my dad she wanted correlle plates, and the next day he brought home a box of hilton hotel plates, which were made by the same folks. those plates -- those white plates with the raised h border were a symbol of my childhood -- were not even remotely like the correlle plates my mom wanted, but she didn't fuss. now, more than seven years after my father's death, here she is, finally buying those desired plates.) i wanted to go to tuesday morning, so we made plans to get ready and leave quickly.
tuesday morning turned out to be closed until ten, so at 9:35 we walked over to ross, where my mom bought paul a cooking set (cooktop and pans) to be stored at her house. paul pushed around a pink stroller, which he called a cart. cam had accidentally left paul's shoes in our car, so i was looking for a new pair of shoes for him (his current shoes are on the verge of being outgrown, anyway). i put a pair of ugly black ones on him. they fit, but no one was happy with them so they ended up back on the shelf.
we left ross and went to tuesday morning. paul played with a toy microwave that didn't work. "damn," he said. a lady shopping nearby laughed. we didn't see anything we wanted, so we left empty-handed. paul did show a fondness for a spatula, but didn't protest when i took it from him.
we then drove to citadel. paul napped. i hadn't been there in a few months, but since i knew that construction was going on, i wasn't too terribly surprised by the changes. my mom, on the other hand, hadn't been there in years. she was astonished. we walked into a shoe store, hoping to find shoes for paul, but they only carried adult shoes. "me," paul said, pointing to a pair of black strappy stilettos. um, no. (he had said earlier he wanted "nice. black. shoes." but these were clearly not it.) we ended up buying him a pair of cute little white shoes at the reebok outlet. my mom asked if she could pay for them. hey, why not? she also paid for lunch (of which paul ate a lot -- yay, pachanga grill!) and bought herself some plates and a jacket.
we hit big lots and rite-aid on our way home, looking for ornaments that could withstand the outdoor cemetery life. by then it was after three and i was exhausted. a boy had refused to walk for the majority of the day, and i was dressed for an air-conditioned office, not for lugging around a hefty toddler and a diaper bag on a warm day. my own poor judgment, clothingwise, sure, but i think i would have been okay if the child would have walked.
when we arrived at home, paul wanted to watch tv and wouldn't nap. i wrapped paul's cooking stuff for my mom. there was much play, blue's clues, eating, "it's a small world" and crying before paul finally succumbed to sleep around 9:30. then i uncorked a bottle of wine and here i am.