That particular Saturday was Father's Day

Our story begins on the first Saturday after Father's Day. We had deferred our celebrations for six days because the awesome present that my beautiful wife organised three weeks in advance was still in the post.* Based on an entirely fictitious assurance that it would only be a few days late, we decided we could celebrate father's day a few days late too. Of course, the gift still didn't arrive, but we figured that if we went ahead we would get to eat pancakes, and so go ahead we did.



My slightly late father's day started slightly early. Next year I shall explain to Cherub that father's day is, among other things, a day for letting daddy sleep in instead of waking me up at 5.30am. I explained it this year too but apparently he wasn't convinced. Still, we had a pleasant if offensively early breakfast together and waited for the rest of the family to wake up so we could start with the cooking of the pancakes.



After consuming slightly more maple syrup than was strictly necessary, we decided that it was a good day for a trip to the local swimming pool and off we went.

Our local pool appears to be subject to some sort of council regulation to the effect that every couple entering the pool must consist of an awesomely hot woman and an average looking and surprisingly hairy man. This meant that Honey Bear and I got in with no questions asked and we were offerred some modelling work for the pool's next advertising campaign.**

Bundle did an excellent job of showing me all the stuff he has been learning at his swimming lessons and Cherub did a pretty decent job of keeping up even though he won't even start lessons until next term. It was all very pleasant, apart from the mild case of tantrums when we said it was time to get out and have some lunch. Soon enough, it was back in the pool for more paddling, giggling, and attempting to catch boys between the end of the waterslide and the bottom of the pool.

We did this reasonably well, most of the time.

After four hours or so, it was time to head home. We parked our tired but happy children in front of "The Heffalump Movie" on DVD (with soundtrack by Carly Simon, just in case you were wondering what she's been doing since "You're so Vain"), cleaned up a few things around the house, cooked dinner for the boys, and, not a moment too soon, it was time to head for Lygon Street and dinner with fabulous blogging friends.

It was an evening that can be summed up in just six words.

Awesome. Awesome awesome awesome. Freakin' awesome.

For those who want a little more detail, I grabbed a drinkable Cab Merlot and drove over to Lygon Street, where parking is an entertaining challenge*** and walked a reasonably considerable distance to Papaginos. I was a little stunned to find I was early and even more surprised to find there was no need to wait for a table.

I have to admit to a fairly severe case of the nerves at this point. I has met Actonb once before, which meant I had gotten those nerves out of the way a while ago, but the thought of meeting Gigglewick was a little intimidating. Still, after a few minutes, two awesome people arrived and I could stop worrying.

I should also confess that I am completely hopeless at working out the 'do we do the kiss hello' issue, particularly on a first meeting . I get anxious, I look for the subtle cues that other people seem to instinctively be aware of, I find nothing, and I fight the temptation to fake a sudden coma in order to avoid the whole issue. Fortunately, Giggles cut through the whole tangle by walking in and saying "Hi, we should kiss".

The night passed very pleasantly from there. We ate garlic bread and a reasonably curious pizza topped with potato and something that may have been prosciutto, I didn't check. Someone, not being me, had the sense to order a salad. We chatted about whatever. It was good.

There is nothing surprising in the revelation that MsB and Giggles are excellent company. The only surprises I can think of from that night were discovering just how much Actonb knows about the finer points of burial at sea, and the remarkable statistic of Giggles only saying "dude" once even though we were there for over four hours.

Having knocked off the pizza and the merlot, the original plan was that we would then head over to Brunswick Street and have a few drinks at Polly's. As it turned out, we were all too chilled out to do this so we went with Gigglewick's excellent suggestion that we should wander up to Readings and browse for a while. We hung out and looked at books, we went to one of the million good places for coffee on Lygon Street, we wandered a little further and found some pretty decent gelati, we chatted some more, we took photos that will never appear on this blog, and, to my great regret, it got late and it was time to head home.

So, after a very fun night, all that was left was the long drive home, which gave me time to think about just how much it sucks that neither MsB nor Giggles actually lives in Melbourne, but also how wondrously good is blogging, without which I never would have met either one of these fine people in the first place.

If you haven't met these people yet, and you get the chance, take it.

* Okay, yet to be posted. Possibly still being manufactured. It turned up about two weeks later and it is every bit as good as expected

** Exagerrating? On this blog? How dare you, etc

***next week, Brunswick Street, where parking takes longer than actually getting there