Days of hiking, boating, and temper monitoring

On Thursday, 15 September, upon Dad's arrival home, he had a great
conversation with Logan. Logan explained how he got a new police car
and how he borrowed another car from his pal Bradon. He was accurate
and easy to understand, and to top it all off, it was really fun
conversing! From the old man's perspective he is becoming quite
eloquent and is turning into an intelligent smart little tyke.
And from a potty training perspective, Logan has no trouble using the
potty to go wee, but insists on having a diaper on when doing poos.
Friday Logan and Bradon went together to Play Group at the Toy Library.
There they got to see the 'recently-made-famous' Australian Veggie Man.
Veggie Man is meant to teach the kids how important vegetables and
fruit are to eat. The costume is one of a large 'creature' made up of
vegetable parts, to include veggies for eyes, noes, mouth, and hair.
Dad came right after Veggie Man left and he entertained Bradon and Logan
primarily by spinning them around on a see-saw and lifting them higher
than is otherwise normal for a see-saw. This of course was their now
newfound favorite plaything, which of course then became Dad's cursed
plaything as it quickly began wearing him out.
After getting home from Play Group, Dad quickly got his hiking and
camping equipment ready as he was headed out on an overnight hiking
expedition on the famous Larapinta Trail (section 4) with two of his
friends. It was a 17.7 kilometer section from Birthday Gap to Standley
Chasm, incorporating quite a bit of up and down terrain, a good portion
of which was on rocky ground. Dad truly found out just how out of
shape he was! Both legs were cramping up as he reached the Brinkley
Summit of the tallest mountain (not that tall) along the MacDonnell
Ranges in that area. It was getting quite dark and we had intended on
camping at the summit. This was why Dad's legs cramped... he was going
too fast up a never-ending steep incline. But we all made it and then
had a lovely dinner under a full moon, stars, and cloudless sky. The
log book at the summit indicated that some German tourists had been
there camping 3 days prior in extremely cold, wet, rainy, clouded over
weather! Boy were we lucky! That night we sat around a little
hand-warmer campfire and played a card game "Worst case scenario" in
which you guess the best option you would take if confronted in a
dangerous or bad situation. The game was somewhat whimsical for some of
the situations, however, we nearly had to be airlifted home because of
the lack of oxygen when laughing at one card. It asked the question,
"How would you attack an alien?" The three choice answers were: A) Poke
it in the eyes (eyes are most likely to be the only obvious and large
identifiable object of an alien) B) Don't attack an alien, they
generally have been known to abduct people for short periods of time for
experiments and then returned. C) Jump up and down, then punch the
alien in the mouth, and run. The answer was B. Hmm, it doesn't seem
quite as funny now so maybe we were laughing so hard from exhaustion!?
The next morning, a little while after watching sunrise, we headed out
along the ridge for a magnificent view of the surrounding area and
ranges. We had homemade breakfast burritos along the way and were
delighted with the beautiful weather... well, except for the atrocious
number of flies. By the time we arrived in Standley Chasm, it was
getting to be 2:00 PM and Dad's feet were burning from the ups, downs,
and rocky creek bed he had to navigate. The next two days he spent
trying to recover from the aching calves, feet, and shoulders, but it
was well worth it and quite enjoyable.
Immediately after getting home from the hike, Dad took Logan out to the
annual world-famous Henley-on-Todd Regatta in which people race boats
down the 'dry' Todd river bed. The final event of the day includes
three large full size boats (4WD trucks underneath) that have a number
of people put on a mock naval battle with water balloons, cannons,
etc... Earlier Mom took Logan to the Henley-On-Todd parade in which
lollipops were thrown from these large boats to the spectators.
Evidently Logan got a lollipop and so he kept begging to see the big
boats.
With perfect timing, Dad and Logan arrived as the last big boat entered
the arena and the mock naval battle got underway. Big booming blasts
from the cannon really got Logan excited and he loved seeing them race
around and around, with everyone on board the ships getting soaked wet
by the water balloons, cannons, and water guns. The Viking ship this
year had a secret weapon in which a large slingshot 360 degree turnable
turret was placed on top and they were able to launch water balloons at
the spectators as well as their adversary ships. In the end the Vikings
won.
On Sunday Dad showed Logan how to fill up the gas tank in the car and
check the air pressure in the tires for the first time. We also went
over to a coworkers house to trade infant baby clothes (got some baby
girl clothes and gave some baby boy clothes since they were expecting a
baby boy soon). Oh, and earlier in the day Dad and Logan went to the
gas station to get the paper and then on to get Dad's mail from the APO
U.S. post office demountable. Logan likes to get on his bike to do this
and he does a marvelous job keeping his feet on the pedals throughout
the journey. He especially likes to use Dad's Base badge to de-lock the
gates and doors to get in the demountable to get the mail.
Tuesday night Dad and Mom got a babysitter (Emily) to watch Logan.
Logan really loves playing with Emily so that makes it easy on us to
take a break. However, in our case the break we took was a bit
different than most people's as we went out to a prenatal refresher
class to go over all the things we forgot about since our last birth!
Since we had a C-Section the first time and were about to attempt a VBAC
(vaginal birth after cesaerean) this time, a lot of it really was
all-new all-over again for us. It was well worth the time spent there
and we really enjoyed it. Hopefully now we'll be ready for the actual
event (HA!) Oh, and earlier this afternoon Mom went to a mid-wives
check-up possibly for the last time before the baby comes as her next
appointment is in two weeks and the baby (Grubette as she is still
referred to as) is due only 2 days after that! Yikes!
Today Logan was in a bit of a funk, with him being generally
non-cooperative and grouchy. To top it off, he has about 7 large nasty
mosquito bites that are irritating him incessantly. Our recently turned
two year old boy definitely proved himself to be a member of the
terrible two's today and is getting more and more adamant that things go
his way or no way. Mom and Dad are trying to keep this fiery ball of
fury under control as much as possible, but we'll see if our levy can
withstand the intense pressures.