Austin's sister Liz and her husband Matt took their vacation last week. In the course of their wanderings they happened upon a couple really great malted milk shakes. Since then, malt has been on our brains. Austin googled it before we left to figure out what exactly is malt in the first place (I'll let him explain that one!), and of course, like any food item, thinking and talking about it just made it seem more and more attractive.
The first morning we were in Annapolis, we ate breakfast at the famous Chick and Ruth's diner where we noticed malted shakes on the menu. Unfortunately, it was only 9 am so we skipped actually having one. What a missed opportunity! Malted milk shakes apparently are NOT so readily available in Virginia Beach. It has been my goal this week to have one, and I've been reduced to calling any place in the yellow pages under "diner" or "ice cream parlor."
Last night we set out after an early supper with the names of three ice cream places in the area that have malted milk shakes. Sounds easy enough? I thought so.
Until we got stuck in traffic. And more traffic. And got swept away in left turn only lanes. And have you ever noticed how it's impossible to find an address when you're on vacation? Also, those little free maps that are everywhere make things look a LOT closer than they actually are.
More than an hour into our trip, we finally stopped for directions and successfully found one of the places. But it turned out Austin couldn't eat the ice cream there (they used peanut butter and Austin couldn't be sure the ice cream and scooping utensils and blender wouldn't be cross-contaminated).
After having a personal crisis (do I get a malt when my husband can't???), Austin persuaded me to get one and we would go on to the next place to see if he could eat one there. I would tell you how good the malt was but since Austin will read this, it's not really fair... because of course the next place was closed.
But I get ahead of myself, because it was there at the first place that we noticed the funny smell emanating from Tucker's rear parts that suggested a powerful explosion had occurred. Because it was supposed to be such a quick after-dinner ice cream trip, I hadn't thought about bringing a diaper or wipes....
To make a long story short, three napkins and no diaper got Tucker home, after a quick visit to the next (closed) ice cream store and a dirty park. We did stop and get Austin ice cream at the grocery store where the clerk thought I was asking if they had malt liquor.
The whole adventure took a bit more than two and a half hours. To get ice cream. Technical note: we could've almost driven back home in that same amount of time.
Needless to say, Tucker was in bed woefully late and wound up enough that he didn't actually fall asleep till after 9 pm. It was one of the few nights where it crossed Austin's mind that he might be asleep before the little man.
If two and a half hours in suburban traffic last night wasn't bad enough, today was an exercise in damage control with an over-tired toddler. Tucker was down for his morning nap before 11 am, and in bed for the night by 5:30 pm. In the meantime... well, we just endured.
P.S. I managed to lose my camera today. I carefully placed it on the top of Austin's toolbox in his truck while buckling Tucker up, and then promptly forgot about it as we drove away. Unfortunately, that means no pictures of crazy man playing miniature golf at Pirate Land (he was very good at chasing our balls, picking them up and putting them in the hole), grabbing Austin's ears on our bald cypress hike, and generally being amusing. Thankfully, I haven't lost our flip video... yet.
