I Suck At Hanging Out With Karen's Cousins

last night began the big grandchild weekend for karen's nana. with the upcoming sale of karen's grandmother's house, a bunch of the grandchildren thought it would be a nice idea to spend one last night at the house together so that they could reminisce and whatnot about the old times with nana, grandpa, the house, etc. (karen's family is quite sentimental that way.)

anyway, only grand children were allowed to stay over during the weekend. so for me, this weekend is great because i get to have a man-weekend full of carousing, booze, and debauchery... not necessarily in that order. just kidding.

as karen was working late at her regular full-time job, she needed someone to fill in for her at her part-time job at the south shore ymca in quincy that she works at on friday nights. since i am a substitute at the south shore ymca, i naturally agreed to work for her.

not working regularly at the south shore ymca can be difficult because i don't feel as connected with the program participants and whatnot. i simply am not there enough to get to know the participants. truth be told, it's actually one of the things that i do miss about working regularly at the south shore ymca: being involved with the participants and helping them achieve their fitness goals, whatever that may be.

regardless, yesterday was probably the easiest substitution work that i had to do for the ymca because... well... none of the participants showed up for the class. so i did what any normal person would do while waiting for the participants to show up: i ran 3 miles. that was a big mistake. aside from the fact that i have not run 3 miles in quite some time, i did not factor in the whole "sweat" factor.

luckily for me, i do not perspire that badly. by no means was my clothes drenched or anything. my clothes just had that "sweat" feel to them, which would have been bad if any program participants actually showed up after my run. needless to say, no one ever showed up.

so karen met up with me at the ymca after her work and we both headed to my favorite sister-in-law's (janine). as it turned out, karen's cousins (billy and sj) were up for the grandchildren weekend. too bad i suck at hanging out with karen's cousins.

not all of karen's cousins could make the weekend sleepover. i think of the 11 grandchildren (i think there are 11), only 4 were going to be sleeping over this weekend. billy, who works for general mills, flew in from the midwest for the weekend but was actually not sleeping over. he was just here for a visit.

the four that were sleeping over karen's grandmother's house included karen, janine, sj, and karen's cousin from lowell (karlene).

anyway, it was an interesting time at janine's. when karen and i arrived, i believe the topic of discussion was some person who worked for fedex that sj had been dating. needless to say, the relationship did not last long due to some unfortunate circumstances.

in addition to the usual hanging around, telling stories and all the other general silliness, my favorite brother-in-law (pj) busted out the cigars. pj and billy hopped into the hot tub while the gummy bear song was playing. (for anyone curious, the gummy bear song... is somewhat catchy.) oh yes, we also got to see the wild turkey that sj and billy's brother (kirk) hunted and killed. it was an interesting picture to say the least. kirk was all decked out in camouflage, standing in front of a silver rv with a turkey in his hand. (they're southern... from georgia.)

all in all, it was good to see sj and billy. i hope they have a great weekend.