Survival Training and Walmart

   I just looked at the calendar, and I am a whole week behind schedule. I have 482* unanswered emails from one week ago! It's like time stopped!

   So, bear with me while I think through the last week, and the 682** things that have happened.

So, Thursday was the Survival Suit Training Class, required for Federal Permit holders. What a riot! The guys all said it was a great class, they learned a lot, and I think every one of them said they'd never actually been in their suits before so the experience was helpful. The instructor was a very nice guy, we enjoyed him and his sense of humor. And we wives enjoyed the show!!

They were soooo mad at me for taking pictures, but how could I resist? It's not often that a roomful of guys undress in front of me!

That's a smoking flare.

I forget what he called this one, an orange smoke flare, maybe? You can see it for miles, and you can write with it...he marked out SOS on the ground, underwater, and it stayed there!

Davie. I had my eye on Davie. He can't swim. Can't float at all, sinks like a stone. We ALL had an eye on Davie.

Whaddaya know? The suits work! He floated like a turd! We had to pry him out of the water. Didn't he love swimming around in that thing!

Look, Ladies! They can be trained!

     It was a great class. Special thanks to the SeaCoast Mission for funding assistance, and to Lewis for setting it up.

     Friday we interviewed 2 applicants for our teaching positions at School. We are smitten with both applicants, and have offered them the positions. Further details cannot be divulged until the school board meets and officially accepts their contracts. But I can say, we are thrilled!

    This past Wednesday and Thursday I spent off the island with Thing two. My friend Scott agreed to babysit Thing One and Tammy's older two, at lunchtime and after school, and we took the two little ones with us. It was a very long two days!

But, we both came back with a lot of needed supplies, and the summer is off to a rolling start!

    I can't print all of my escapades here...those in the know will laugh and understand...but suffice it to say:

1. there was a head-first fall into the Southwest Harbor Library (by me, not the kid. Shut up. It takes great talent to fall up stairs.),

2. a good third of Wednesday was spent in the bathroom at Home Depot with Thing Two, who spent the rest of the day commando,

and

3. I may be banned from Walmart for life.

      Apparently, I am not meant to shop in WallyWorld by myself. 

When Thing One was about 10 months old, I left her with The Big Guy at the hotel and wandered  Walmart aimlessly for hours. It was, quite literally, the first time I had been alone since she was born. (Where did I go, why, Walmart, of course! It was late at night, around Christmastime, and if memory serves- it was the only place open.) 

When I got to the register, I noticed that some of my items were wet as I placed them on the belt-thing. Not dripping, but drips of water, or something. I didn't care. It wasn't much, and it was stuff that it didn't bother, not clothes or anything. Then I picked up the gallon of bleach in my cart. It was cracked, and dripping. I asked the clerk for some paper towels to wrap it in (yup, I was still gonna buy it), and she freaked. She made an announcement overt the intercom...and suddenly I was surrounded by The Walmart HazMat Team! Dressed to the nines in some waterproof coveralls and plastic gloves that went up to the shoulder!

They confiscated my cart. Well, they tried. I fought. And won! Don't mess with a tired Marissa who finally got some alone time, and think you're going to force her to repeat the shopping experience. I did give them the bleach, but only because they went back and got me a new gallon. I was there for something like 3 hours.

The big guy called me no less than 482* times during this incident.

When I got back to the hotel room, Thing One was in hysterics with hunger (I was nursing), she had on the clothes I'd brought for the next day, and the outfit she'd been wearing when I left was hanging from the ceiling fan, whizzing above our heads at full tilt. The Big Guy is nothing if not ingenious. Not smart enough to change the kid at the first hint of disaster, but he can make a clothes dryer out of a ceiling fan.

I didn't go off -island again for 4 months.

Another time, I had just walked into the store when Thing One decided she NEEDED TO NURSE RIGHT THEN. NOT IN 10 MINUTES. RIGHT THEN. No matter that we had to catch a ferry. So, I ran to the back of the store, to the kiddo section, and nursed her quickly in her infant seat attached to the cart. I stopped as soon as she'd let me, and let her fuss as I ran- ran, I tell you- through the store, grabbing the things on my list.

Now, in the real world, you other Mothers have options. You get to take your kids home when they're having a temper tantrum, like Dr. Phil says to. You would have scrapped the Walmart shopping experience at this point, maybe went out to the car to nurse leisurely, or maybe even gone home, and come back later that night when your Big Guy got home from work. We islanders have no such luxury. If you don't buy toilet paper, YOU HAVE NO TOILET PAPER! I'm kinda fond of tp, myself. I needed the things on my list(can you say 'StayFree'?)! !

I let her cry, and I collected the stuff on my list as fast as I could. All I could think was that I was still going to miss the ferry ride home. 

I got to the register, and threw my stuff up on the belt. When the cart was empty, I spoke briefly with the clerk, and thought it was strange that she spoke back, but wouldn't make eye contact. Perplexed, I kept my eyes on her while she rang up my purchases...and she was looking everywhere but AT me. It was weird. Ah, well, I thought, she's twelve, she's probably never seen somebody so frazzled, and a mess. I'm probably covered with spit-up, or something.

I looked down to see if I was....and there was my boob.

My boob was out.

I never closed my nursing bra, or my shirt after I nursed the baby.

I ran through the store,on a Friday afternoon in summer, with a crying baby, and my whole boob was out. And my boobs are HUGE.

How many people must have seen me?!?Do you know how many people hit that Walmart on a Friday...like every tourist on the way to Bar Harbor!

I've had 3 other bad Walmart experiences to date, and to this day my friend Leslie goes straight to the bathroom whenever she goes to a Walmart, calling my name, half expecting to find me there, in tears.

I don't know why they let me in the door. Maybe it's my bill.

*482 is my new favorite number. It's outrageous enough to not be mistaken for actual fact, but yet somehow cool. You may adopt it if you so wish.

**682 also works well. Be warned, however, that it is slightly less cool.

Tomorrow I will show you a sleeve on the wave sweater, and tell you (because I didn't take any pictures) what I got my swap partner, Dawn. And I'm going to have to send her a second package, because brat # 2, I mean, Thing Two, took stuff out of the box, and I didn't know it...and mailed it off. This is why some people beat their kids. Not me, some people.