while looking for said socks and shirt, the house gets quiet. i investigate and find them both on the back patio outside in the 40 degree weather, happy as clams, swinging their legs over the closest big wheels and dog-piling (cat-piling?) on Koshka the Cat, who is not amused and just wants his food and water bowls refilled. 
lucy goes for a drink...barefoot (4 times socks are off, at least)
we get our money's worth with lucy's favorite activity...crawling up and down the stairs.
so we get to learn all about what stomach acid sounds like and ethan's favorite is (not to be crass) "snot." there is a big nose and you pull a lever and it blows out a mist of "snot" (water) on the unsuspecting person below (in this case "daddy") and whenever he see their surprise, ethan laughs and laughs and laughs til he almost falls off the crate he's kneeling on (see below)
anyhow, back to my errands (i'm sure enjoying these tangents!). we stop at the ATM for actual cash i never seem to have, then head to copytech, the local copy center. upon entering, ethan immediately spots the almost empty candy machine and promptly asks for a "coin". when i say "i don't have any" he decides to check my pockets for me. i notice a basket of walnuts with a "free sample" sign, so i give him one of those instead, (yes, an actual nut) displaying a logo on the shell (for a logo-stamper they are trying to sell) and he chucks the walnut at a guy waiting in line, narrowly missing his head. then he starts doing quick laps (with lucy doing her Frankenstein walk on his heels) around the four xerox machines while i impatiently wait to be helped (the laminating machine i was in line for was busy sealing several huge fundraising banners).
we finally finish. we bolt to avoid further nut-throwing, and then the same get-into-the-car routine with lucy kicking and screaming not wanting to be restrained and ethan hopping into the driver's seat, but this time he wises up and LOCKS the doors. then smiles. i get out my keys, unlock, and toss him into his seat with one bribe or another and say, "seatbelts!" and he echoes..."so we're safe!" just like cartoon Dora. gotta love when they actually teach useful stuff on tv...
then we head for comcast cable tv. we hit geneva road (the industrial non-scenic route) and he spots the "train tracks" and "dumptrucks," so all is well in ethan's world. we pull into comcast to return our broken DVR, because in this day and age ... once you've been exposed to commercial-free tv and 80 hours of recorded shows to watch at your leisure, there is NO GOING BACK! i swap it out, lament the 80 hours of lost shows on the broken player, and in 3 minutes, we're done.
comcast has this HUGE building with ceilings two stories high and ethan thought for SURE this place had to have toys and began the search, but all he found was the "semi-circle" couch (sectional). he and lucy begin to play hide-and-seek with lucy leaning against the side of the couch and ethan jumping all over it (with his shoes, i might add) until he spots her. she knows what's up and laughs when we come after her. she's walking pretty well now, but still moves faster on the crawl...
THEN, another car re-entry struggle and we head to the "ABC store," as i so aptly renamed it in order for it to sound attractive to a 2 yr old--instead of the long-winded "utah and idaho map supply house," (what, do they only sell maps of utah and idaho? NO! they sell maps from all over the world, of course). i was in search of an ABC train, you know, the ones you see in preschools wrapped around the upper walls with upper and lower case letters? well, we found it, but in the few minutes it took me, ethan had already stacked up a pile of ABC goods he wanted to take home in the form of puzzles, games, and anything train-looking.
lucy, meanwhile, had discovered the revolving racks and was giving them a twirl. though i couldn't see her, i could smell her, which signaled time to go! when at last i replaced everything they had knocked off, i noticed the sign: "please do not let your children run around the store" etc etc. i also found the play corner, complete with a train track. so just as i was ready to leave, the kids were buckling down to play.
and then i notice the lollipop in lucy's mouth. where did she get that? eew...i notice another half-eaten one on the floor not too fresh looking(well, you've heard of ABC (Already Been Chewed?) gum, fitting for the ABC store...) so i yanked it out of her mouth to her loud protests and looks from other customers whom i can only think must be non-moms due to very unsympathetic scowls. i once again, after several tries, extricate kids from toys and ABC candy and pile them into the car...unhappy...once again.
we get home, i take a deep breath, then notice while passing a mirror that i was wearing one of those size stickers, you know the ones that say "S S S S S for small" running six inches vertically down the front of your shirt? mine, of course, said XL, XL, XL, XL....but you know, there is very little dignity in motherhood. i'm over it.
