The Decaffeination Process

With no visitors around, we took a break from our busy tourism schedule this weekend to pursue other aims. Having survived their first overnight separation, mom and baby had a chance to get reacquainted while I set about cleaning our big truck. It was filthy, so it was a big job.

When we bought it, the truck had just come back from 6 years service in the fleet of an electric supply company in Toronto. That's 6 years of dirty hands and dirty boots moving around in that cab. I don't know when the last time was that they cleaned it, but it certainly wasn't anytime in 2007. The worst part was the cup holder. Just imagine how many cups of Tim Horton's coffee sloshed over their r-r-r-rims in that time. The bottom of the little tray for loose change looked like a tar pit. Lodged in the sticky sediments there was a fossilized metal washer.


I managed to clean off the dash, seats and doors, but I didn't even bother trying to wipe down those cup holders. Instead, I pulled the entire apparatus out of the console and dumped it in a bucket of soapy water. When I scrubbed it out, I discovered a second hidden washer and something that resembled a chicken bone. Absolutely disgusting. I think I'll always regard those cup holders with some degree of suspicion.


When I went out this morning to install it all back in the truck, I found a parking ticket waving at me from beneath the wiper blade. I was cited for "parking an oversized vehicle in more than one parking space but providing insufficient coin deposits for meter used" (by-law 2003-530 26). I hate to be picky, but there were no "spaces" marked on the street, and there were no parking meters, so there was nowhere to "provide sufficient coin deposits." Another truck like ours was parked on the same street and he got the same ticket, but the other 25 cars came through unscathed. I would love to contest the ticket, but I've heard you have to wait all day in the courtroom to save yourself $35. I'll try fighting it, but I may have bigger fish to fry when moving time comes around.


Not wanting to risk another ticket, we packed the whole family into the truck and drove it over to the church parking lot, where it will stay for the next three weeks. This also served as a test of our travel arrangements. I'm happy to say that the three of us fit in there quite nicely: dad at the wheel, Scott in his carseat in the middle, and mom over on the other side, craning her neck to see over the dash. It's a bit of a loud, bumpy ride, but it should work. R isn't that enthusiastic about getting behind the wheel. I think she's going to leave most of the driving to me.



I've included some pictures of Scott in his church clothes, since he looked so dapper today. This outfit is for 12-17 pounds, which should be just right for him, but the pants were hanging off his skinny little waist. It's funny how his swelling tummy fades into nothing at his belt line.