My Marvelous Son and His Money

Ok - back to the money...

Yesterday we decided that since Caleb was home from school but was perky and not acting sick, we'd go to the Reading Museum. Steve went to work and the rest of us rode a bus to the train station then walked about 2 blocks to the museum.

We had a nice time learning about Reading. There used to be a big biscuit company here called Huntley & Palmers and it was world famous. Reading came to be known as "Biscuit Town" because of the biscuit factory.

It was cool watching Caleb - he really got into it. They have these clipboards that they let kids use and they give them paper and pencils. Caleb wrote down everything he saw. He sounded out the words and got pretty close on most of them. I translated on the pages so that if we keep the pages we'll know what he saw.

We ate lunch there at the museum. Gwen and her girls had jacket potatoes (baked potatoes), my kids split a cheese sandwich, and Terry and I each ordered tapas - Spanish "pub food" as Steve so delicately told us. We each got 6 different things - fried prawns, vegetable fritter, some kind of fish cake, some kind of croquette-things, spicy meatballs, and something with fried onions and zucchini. I ordered a 2-person order and shared with my kids. Terry ordered a one-person order and went at it alone.

After lunch we went back into the museum to finish looking at stuff we hadn't yet seen - we went into their "Box Room" - a place where visitors are encouraged to pick up and touch different things from the museum's collections. Caleb liked the microscope and put just about everything underneath it for scrutiny. Audrey just liked picking up a Tibetan bell and ringing it. Good thing it had a nice ring.

Done with the museum - headed out to the shopping area in Reading.

We wanted to get a cell phone for the Adams - got a Nokia, but I'm still trying to figure out if they can use it in the States if they unlock it.

Then we went into the mall and got the kids and Terry an ice cream. Hindsight being 20/20, that probably wasn't the smartest decision we made yesterday. Gwen and I got coffee at Starbucks. But Gwen had to re-order her coffee because the Eastern European employees didn't understand that she just wanted a medium cup of coffee in a large cup so she could "doctor" it like she wanted. They kept trying to give her a medium Americano coffee (already with milk) in a large cup. She wanted to put her own milk in. And I discovered that my favorite coffee, a breve latte, likely doesn't exist over here. It's made with half-and-half in the States. What's the UK equivalent of that? Oh well - probably better that I didn't get it with heavy cream - more fattening.

On to the Disney Store. While T&G and the kids (except Julie) were there, I wanted to go to a photo kiosk to upload some pictures from a memory stick that I've been needing to get printed for several weeks now. BOTH machines at BOTH ends of the mall were broken. Grrr. That's irritating.

Back to the Disney Store. By this time, Caleb has his money out and is on the prowl. He had £3.07 (I guess he lost 3p somewhere - oh well). He kept picking stuff up that was too much. We finally settled on a punch-out "board" game from the movie "Cars." To give you an idea of the size and material of the game, it was with the coloring books and is made from the same stuff that covers of coloring books are made of.

Outside the mall to the bus. We missed one bus because there were already 3 strollers on the bus and we had 2. So we took the little girls out of the strollers, put Julie in the front pack, gathered up the stuff that was in/on the strollers, folded them, and waited for the next bus. We all pile on, the strollers get stowed, Terry sits downstairs and the rest of us head upstairs. About 4-5 minutes from home, Caleb tells me he doesn't feel well. Great. So we take his game out of the bag and now he has a lovely Buzz Lightyear Disney Store bag to puke in.

Thankfully he doesn't puke on the bus. We all get off and across the street to the house. As I'm fishing for the keys, I look up and there's a rather large puddle of what once was the contents of Caleb's tummy right in front of the door. I pull my turtleneck sweater up over my nose and help get everyone inside then Terry and I use a mop bucket and a watering can I found in the garage to wash the stuff away. Not 10 minutesafter we finish, Steve gets home.

Long story short, Steve has it now. It's 7.52 a.m. and he's upstairs sleeping. He had planned on taking today off anyway so we could all go to Portsmouth to see the HMS Victory, but I don't think that will happen. I do know that we are going to get Terry over to a private hospital this morning to get a blood test done that he needs for his doctor to regulate his medication.

I'm going to go now and beat my children. Or child. Caleb has turned into a surly teenager and I want to kill him. Sick or not.