I'm baaaaack..

After three glorious weeks away from Montreal and then 2 weeks spent trying to catch up to everything that went on while I was gone.

What's the point of having a vacation, if they are just going to save all the work for you when you get back? What about mass distribution? Here, you do this, he does that and when she comes back she can just pick up and follow along. But, noooooooo..

So it was a lovely three weeks, and since I left on a Tuesday afternoon - NO BORDER WAIT TIMES! Yes! It was the fastest border crossing every.. Hi! Where you going? How long you staying? Are these all your kids? Ok, have fun! Vrooom.

The the guy working the toll booth at Harriman was checking me out. "Do you need a receipt m'am?" ME: Nah, I'm allright. Toll Booth worker craning his neck to stare at my legs (because I'm wearing shorts) "OH yeah, you're allright.." Gee thanks I feel much better now!

Spent the first few days down there taxiing Mom around, because she wouldn't be Mom if she didn't save up every little errand she has for the very first day I arrive. My sisters or brother can't drive her for some odd reason, so the task falls to me, every summer and every Christmas. Then help Mom around the house (it gets saved for me). Then on Sunday it was off to Wildwood for 6 glorious days lying on the beach doing sweet F-A. The place we stayed in was a great location, however the service sucked. The pillows were all yellow stained which was very obvious through the paper thin pillow cases, and I didn't even want to think about what the mattress looked like. I managed to get some cleaner pillows and another set of pillow cases for all. The towels were big enough to cover a baby's bum, so drying off after a shower was a workout. It was like polishing a car, but minus the Turtle Wax. We went up to Atlantic City for a day and strolled up and down the Boardwalk for 8 hours. At one point we left the kids in the Amusement park and ran across the way to Trump's Taj Mahal to lose some hard earned money and see where 3/4 of the retirement population hang out.

Then back up to North Jersey for another week of playing Mom's Taxi! Yay! We did take some time out to go over and take the Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island Cruise. In all the time we've been living there, we've never done that. It's always a novelty to play tourist in your home field. In my case I have two home fields so I'm always playing tourist somewhere. I highly recommend the Cruise. At 12$ a pop, you get your money's worth, just as long as you don't spend $200 in souvenirs like my Mother.

"But Mom, we live like 20 minutes from here, what do you need souvenirs for?"

"Shhhh now help me find a souvenir for your brother!"

We also got to see the Queen Mary 2 sailing out of New York harbor bound for Southhampton. It's quite an impressive site!

Towards the end of the week it was back down to the Shore again, only to my sister's Shore house in Brick where we have our annual neighbourhood beach party. Over 500 people showed up and the new band that was hired kept people dancing all night.

The only thing I didn't get to do was go over to Central Park, but really go in to NYC around the July 4th holiday? I'm crazy, but not certifiable. So Central Park will get saved for Xmas..

I'm already planning next year's vacation. A one month road trip of the Southwestern US. With the kids. I think that's close to being certifiable.