Quiet

Henry left yesterday morning for his 3 day overnight field trip to Coloma. The trip was nearly cancelled as a result of one of the kids getting head lice - - but in the end, all went off as planned. He is probably at the ho-down right now as we speak. Yee-Haw! He was so excited to go. He is certain that he is going to come back a millionaire since he can pan for gold during any free time he has. He took an extra garbage bag just in case he needed additional luggage to bring home all his loot. With the performance of the market these past weeks, George and I are secretly hoping he also hits the mother lode. It'd be nice if some of the nest egg was just plain g-o-l-d.

Son #1, Georgie, was/is thrilled to be spending time as an only child. Let's just say that the house is significantly quieter without Henry here. Henry is just one of those special kids who needs to make noise constantly -- whether he is playing the recorder, reading out loud, running an endless verbal commentary to whatever he is doing (an audience is not the intention - - just likes to hear himself talking) or just tapping his feet or wiggling around. In our house he is the "hum". Tonight, the only noise is the baseball game in the background and the two George's occasional comments to each other in the way that only men communicate:

G3: Nice Slider.
G2: (5 minutes later) Put 'em away (in response to a walk by the Ray's closing pitcher)
G3: (5 minutes later) Was that a splitter?

This is followed by another 20 minutes of silence. They don't even conversationally respond to each other. Just random blurts and observations. I miss Henry.