A Cluster of a Weekend

The objective was easy; spend the weekend in Chicago and celebrate my nephew's second birthday. But things can never be as easy as they sound, now can they? Friday morning we discovered that my problem-child of a car was leaking a lot of oil. A consultation with the dealership resulted in a no-go for driving my car to Chicago. After a lot of negotiation I was loaned an SUV. Obstacle 1, taken care of. Saturday night, just before the birthday party Scott was opening a beer bottle. The top of the bottle shattered and sliced his middle finger. Two hours at Urgent Care and 5 stitches later obstacle 2 was taken care of. On Sunday morning we left around 9 a.m. to return home. Four hours, two detours, two stand-still accidents and 100 miles later we checked into a hotel. I've always wanted to visit Princeton, IL. Things were looking up when I realized our hotel had a pool and there was a wal-mart next door. I just needed to grab some shorts for Scott and he could go swimming with Evy. See obstacle number 2...no swimming for a guy with stitches. Crap! For $6 I secured some sweet shorts that say "Dream" on the butt and suddenly had myself a white-trash swimsuit. At 10:30 a.m. this morning we arrived home safely. Obstacle 3, tackled.