A polar bear just drowned because of us.

Last week the kids had a sleepover so M and I went out on a date. Giddy with the anticipation of some much needed time alone, we dropped them off and drove to a nearby town for dinner. The evening was cold and beautiful, and we cracked up over something stupid as we jumped from the car and dashed up the street to our restaurant. We enjoyed a long, leisurely, uninterrupted dinner and even took time for cheese and then espressos afterward.

About 2 1/2 hours later we were walking back and were about 50 meters away from our car when M said: "Hmm. That's strange, I think my lights are still on. Well, ha ha. At least we know that the battery still works!"

I giggled.

Then, after about 20 more meters he said: "Wait-- is the engine on???!!"

We were shocked to find the car running, heated to a pleasant 23 degrees Celsius, and our favorite CD playing on the radio!!! It was so bizarre that it took us a while to figure out what had happened.

This is a new car with a remote keyless system, which means that it starts and stops at the push of a button. The only problem is that one probably shouldn't forget to actually push that button before one steps out of the car!!!

Upon further inspection we found a ticket from the police which cited us for unnecessary emissions and fined us 10 euros.

M was impressed that they even have a category for that here, but also found it a laughable amount-- you probably couldn't have paid someone 10 euros to warm up the car for us and put on our favorite CD for after dinner! :-)

I don't think we should return to that town anytime soon...

Child for sale. going cheap,

Me: I've got a surprise for you guys, but you've got to finish your homework before you can have it.

B: What's the surprise?

Me: I'm not going to tell you. Please finish your homework.

B: What's the surprise? What's the surprise? What's the surprise? What's the surprise? What's the surprise? What's the surprise? What's the surprise? What's the surprise?

Me: B, that's really annoying. If you keep that up you're going to lose the surprise.

B: I know! See, the trick is to be annoying right up until the moment before I lose the surprise. Then I have fun AND I still get the reward. I'm really good at that.

Just in case you were wondering.

So there we were in the waiting room at the dentist's office. I was leafing through a women's magazine with B peering over my shoulder. We got to a somewhat racy ad for perfume: a man lying on top of a woman in bed, apparently in the throes of ecstasy. B snorted and shouted: "EWW! GROSS! They're NAKED!"

S was sitting on the other side of the room and shouted: "Who's naked?!"

To which B replied loudly: "Yuck! It's an ad for perfume! And the people are naked! Why on earth would that sell any perfume?"

S's answer: "Well, clothes cover up a lot of the smell when you're sweaty. When you take off your clothes the odor gets stronger. Maybe that's why they need the perfume when they're naked!"

Funny thing is his sense of humor is so dry he might have been joking. But I'm still not sure...

How does he come up with this stuff?!

S walked into the kitchen this evening and he'd scotch taped his eyes open.

We were heading out the door to go out to dinner and he asked me if he could go that way and I said: "be my guest".

I don't think he expected me to call his bluff...