| on Tuesday July 29, 2008 |
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Recently returning home from Cape May, NJ our family had an abnormally hellish ride home. We have three daughters and during our stay in Cape May they all managed to find dozens of amazing sea shells. Now, let me start by saying I am not the kind of guy that gets excited about sea shells but the sea shells they found were actually kind of impressive. My girls found many different kinds of shells over the course of the weekend but the really special ones were the conch shells. They found conch shells ranging from about a half an inch in height to several inches. One of the most large and brilliant shells actually had a resident still inside and this resident, of course, did not want to come out. The only way to get the creature out of the shell was to cook him out. After a boiling the shell with the mollusk in side for nearly ten minutes, the mollusk finally relinquished his control on the shell. The removal of this mollusk from the conch shell was the last thing we did before we packed our car left for home and we noticed that the process had left the kitchen smelling offensive to say the least. We thought nothing of stench in the kitchen since the creator of the smell was now gone and out of our lives…so we thought. At about the twenty mile mark on our way home our minivan began to smell like the oceans rear-end. The smell that envelops a family during long road trips is often unpleasant; however this smell different and like a thick blanket of fog it invaded the interior of our car much to the displeasure of all inside. As the driver of the stink-mobile, I was beginning to get irritated—no check that, extremely upset with each passing stink filled moment. To make matters worse, my kids (who desperately required the conch in the first place) were complaining. “Ew! What is that smell?!” The sound of a child whining is probably the best form of birth control. When a mom and dad have had a tough day with the kids usually the last thing on their minds is, “You know what? Let’s have another.” I think a few well placed whiny kids could change the teenage pregnancy statistics in the U.S. overnight. My particular children were covering their noses and asking for the smell to go away. I know my kids think highly of me, but besides lighting the vehicle on fire (which I was thinking of doing) there was little I could do to mask the offensive scent that surrounded us. I was starting to wonder if the smell would ever come out of the car. I mean, how many pine-scented-car-fresheners would it take to diffuse the smell of rotting mollusk? My kids continued to whine even though they were told to calm down—the smell was that bad. Like all parents I have a breaking point. Apparently my breaking point requires the following ingredients: horrific odor, whiny kids, long car ride, and sand in my shorts. I think ten minutes of these specific environmental conditions could frazzle the most seasoned secret service agent. Up to this point my wife, bless her soul, had been trying to stifle the whining coming from the back seats of our minivan, it was now my turn. As I turned to tell my progeny to remain silent for the rest of their natural born lives, the car did a small swerve. Like when Reese married peanut butter and chocolate, I discovered something ground breaking with that swerve. It turns out that the “swerve” was a more effective measure than my verbal tongue lashing at calming—check that, frightening my kids into submission. The “swerve” wasn’t dangerous or damaging in any way, just merely a swerve coupled with a dad turning around with eyes glaring in disapproval. The combination proved a useful measure to disquiet my rambunctious crew and although the remainder car ride home was painfully smelly it was at least whine free.
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