Let’s Play a Game!

May 22, 2012

It’s called “Save My Parents’ Vacation”.

Hahaha. In short, I asked them yesterday if they were enjoying their vacation at my kitchen table, followed by a comment that at least it’s a dark wood table so it’s a change of scenery from home.

See? It’s a nice set up, but really not worth a stay for an entire vacation.

The long version? Sure – here it is:

Day 1 – Thursday

My parents flew across the country. I did not pick them up at the airport and made them GPS it to my house. I then served them what we lovingly call West Coast pizza, which is practically the opposite of an East Coast pizza. I won’t go so far as to say it’s a saltine with ketchup and American Cheese on top, but it’s just very different in a way I cannot quite pinpoint.

Day 2 – Friday

My parents went to Sears to buy a new washer. I also took them to Kohl’s after work. (Weeeeeee!) We then treated them to burgers and shakes at a diner on the mountain up the road.

Day 3 – Saturday

Kenny and I took our cars for emissions testing (read: my parents babysat), then we all went Cannon Beach. This was a lot of fun. For the record, that’s the first day of stated fun.

Day 4 – Sunday

In the morning, we went to the employee store and then … wait for it… CostCo! Ta da! I really did take them to CostCo like I said here.

We then made a stop at Target for a knee brace for my dad. I couldn’t have scripted that chain of events any better than I did in my blog earlier this week (link above). Hahaha!

After Target, we grilled some burgers and dogs before we celebrated my parents’ 40th wedding anniversary in a suite at the Timbers game. This was also a lot of fun and the Timbers won! We then had dinner at Henry’s (awesome).

Day 5 – Monday

Back to work and school for us. Off to Zoom Care for my parents. What’s Zoom Care? It’s like Urgent Care, but you get to make an appointment. My dad’s knee is sore (hence the knee brace mention earlier). He was given orders to “rest” and a prescription to quell the inflammation. I think they threatened crutches, but he turned ’em down. They had lunch at Arby’s and then came home and sat at my kitchen table with their laptops. Serious fun.

Day 6 – Tuesday

Day of rest / scenic drive to Mount Hood. They’ve done a whole lot of nothing but things they could have done in New Jersey / Pennsylvania (replace Timbers with Union), so they are going to take it easy today and before their planned multi-day “drive around Oregon” ahead of Memorial Day Weekend. My dad thinks it’s best that he stays off his knee for one more day before hitting the sites along the Oregon Coast, and the Mount Hood drive will keep him off his leg and away from having another snooze fest of an afternoon sitting at my kitchen table. (Not that they aren’t welcome to do that. It’s just that it fills me with incredible guilt.)

I feel bad that they are literally – for the most part – having a staycation. Only it’s in Oregon instead of New Jersey.

I have, however, scheduled my mom in to unpack my china place settings. (OK, they are really just fancier casual plates than the casual plates we use every day. You know – like your company place settings. Now…if only I had company to invite over – haha!). I have plenty of other similar activities she could do, but that’s setting her up for an even worse time than sitting at my kitchen table!

What do you like to do on your days off where you hang around the house? Any ideas to put some spice back into this vacation turned staycation?

 

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