Sledding 2013

Oh…Saturday.  How I love thee.  It’s the one day where I have total control over Elijah’s and Luca’s upbringing.  With Diana at work, I get to mold my sons into men.  Which normally involves taking the El to downtown Evanston and consuming 5 Guys burgers and lemonade.  That means they will become obese, diabetic men.

Hopefully.

Last week, after a sizable snowfall, I offered to take the boys to the local sledding hill.  As you recall from last year, this hill is called “Lovelace Park,” almost probably not named after the 1970’s pornography actress.

Steve brought his kiddos along and did me the solid of buying me a giant Dunkin Donuts coffee. 

We arrived at the hill and after a minor Luca meltdown (he couldn’t find his gloves or wanted to bring along a Spider Man figure or I don’t know) found ourselves having a pretty great time.

Steve took the big kids to the big part of the hill and I took Luca over to the smaller part to get his nerve up.  After we slid down twice (“Again!” he screamed over and over) I felt the serious affects of the coffee hit me.

We Hamanns are kind hearted, but we have weak bladders.

I leaned down to Luca level and said, “Whoo boy.  Those two runs sure were fun.  Whelp, I guess it’s time to head home…”

“Noooooo!!!!” Luca shouted.  “Again!”

I looked over to where Eli and his cousins were sledding and tried to find an infraction that would warrant going home as a punishment.  They were all maddeningly well behaved.

I dragged Luca over to his cousins and gave Steve the pantomime of urinating.  Steve enveloped Luca into their “Biggest Sled Train In The World” and I ran to the bathroom hut.

Locked.

My bladder clenched.  I looked around.  To my chagrin, the designers of Lovelace Easy Joke Park hadn’t included any tree coverage to clandestinely pee pee.

I ran back and plastered a giant smile on my face.  I announced with way too much enthusiasm, “Hey Gang!  Uncle Rick is buying everyone McDonald’s for lunch!  Yay!  Let’s go!”

I began running to the car, hoping the children would follow, tempted by nuggets of what is technically called food.   Nope, they wanted to continue doing the extremely fun activity they were already enjoying.

Did I wet my pants?  I don’t know.  Who’s to say?  It was snowy and wet out there.  Pants get wet all the time.