Turn Baby Turn

A long weekend in Myrtle Beach, getting reacquainted with another side of my extended, blended family. Took a little ride to the downtown area to gawk. One evening with Lil K and Big L and the boyz we meandered a sandy warren of tricked-out trailers, some whose porches and lattice skirts bore a sense of permanance, others recently parked, to get to and stroll the Apache Pier, where the cover had been amped up from the usual buck to three bucks, on account of the "live entertainment," which turned out to be a peppy interracial couple under a mirror ball doing karaoke-style standards such as "Rocky Top," and "Carolina Girls," while aging rednecks either shagged or did the hustle on the slick white dance floor in appreciation. Immediately adjacent to the trailer park loomed a hotel of some fifteen or so stories. Big L and I fed quarters into an anchored set of binoculars in a futile attempt to surveillance the rooms. Back at the cabana the little ones enjoyed the pool nestled just behind the dune. I marveled at a Tassimo one-cup coffee maker. I slathered my boys with sunscreen and dropped a lot of twenties at places like Myrtle Waves and Ripley's Believe-It-Or-Not Aquarium. All in all, we had a blast, then headed back to our little cottage in our little town for the first day of school. One started kindergarten, another second grade. Lots of forms to fill out, lots of things to go over with the boys. Not only does school start on the ninth of August here, the daily start time has been moved up from 7:35 to 7:25. Helping the wife move her office: the woman across the hall left, and now we get an office with a window. I visited my academic adviser and tried to nail down some aspects of my funding, then hustled upstairs to the studio to procure my own desks and space. Back home I whipped out a kick-ass paella using a chicken carcass I purchased in a moment of panic from an Ingles on Exit 24 off I-20 in Georgia.