Weekend Journal

The mean people at the deli counter at Shop Rite made me cry, but other than that, it was a lovely weekend.

Sunday afternoons are always a disaster at Shop Rite. I should probably go during the week, but I don't like to squander work time with dumb things like food shopping. And it's nice to have fresh lunch meat for the week. But Sunday afternoons are the worst. The aisles are packed with harried families who also can't shop during the week anymore. Their carts are piled sky high with pre-packaged chips and juice boxes. With the jump in food prices, people are avoiding the higher priced supermarkets, which is jamming things up more. Shop Rite can't find enough pimply-faced teenagers to sullenly scan my cans of soup, so the lines are long.

Last night, there were a pile of seniors there for some reason. They usually go during the week, but last night there were all hovering around the deli counter. Which is where I had my problem.

There was a crowd bottle-necked around the deli counter with a half hour wait for sliced bologna. I picked number 11 at the counter, but there were only on number 6, so I ran off to pick up a box of waffles. When I came back, they had somehow zoomed to number 13. I tried to get in there, but two snippy seniors yelled at me for walking away. I wasn't going to get into a fight over sliced bologna, so I just got the hell out of Shop Rite. The kids got peanut butter for lunch today.

Jonah has started soccer again. He's playing better than ever, and we've decided to sign him up for the year round soccer team. He needs to work on technique, but what he lacks in technical knowledge, he make up for in sheer insanity. He rushes down the field with no regard for his personal safety, and the other players give him some distance. The coach puts him in for the whole game, because he doesn't seem to get tired. He does need to work on taking shots though. Maybe I'll do that with him after school today.

When the kids first started doing their sports, Steve and I were pretty grumbly about the tyranny of the sports schedule. Our weekends were no longer our own. But I have grown to love soccer season. On crisp fall afternoons, the boys prance out on the field in their knee socks and black shorts.  They run around and bounce off each other. There's so much more action than baseball. We sit in fold out chairs in great green fields surrounded by hills and the turning leaves.   

Ian's soccer starts next week. Special needs soccer is a whole different experience. There will be kids flying in every direction. One fat kid will on sit a pile of dirt ignoring the hyper, random running and will throw specks of dirt into the air. Randomness can be very amusing.

One short economy post and then a bunch on the Times Magazine section on academia and teaching.