Thursday, April 15, 2004
In Which Our Hero Returns a Wayward Shopping Cart
It is finally, finally really starting to feel like spring in Michigan. No matter how long I end up living here, I will never think this is normal weather. Spring is supposed to start in March, darn it. At my birthday. That is the rule. The state of Michigan is apparently unaware of this, and I disapprove.
But today was actually nice and sunny and above 50 degrees. Since Thursday is one of my free afternoons, when it got to be 5:00 and Mark was officially done working, I suggested/demanded that we go outside to be active. So for the first time in about 6 months, I got out my bike, Mark got out his skates, and away we went on the recreation path that runs right past our apartment complex.
I had promised Mark, who was working much harder on his skates than I on my bike, that we would only be out for about half an hour. When we started retracing our path back towards home, though, we came upon a shopping cart, sitting in the middle of an intersection on the path. How it got there we have no idea. The handle proclaimed it to be from Meijer, though, which is only a few blocks away.*
There's something you have to understand about Mark. He hates seeing shopping carts not put away. Really hates it. So he decided he would push the shopping cart while on his rollerblades. He pushed it all the way to the end of the paved part of the path, only to discover that the path didn't curve the direction he thought it would, so he had to turn around and push it all the way back out to the main street, whereupon we immediately set off for Meijer. I have no doubt that we, or rather, Mark, attracted all kinds of odd looks rolling down the sidewalk that way. Mark skated directly up to the door of Meijer, deposited his cart, and skated off, much to the confusion of the employee standing there.
When I inquired as to whether he felt exercised after our outing, he proclaimed that next time, I could skate and push the cart while he rode the bike. I pointed out that his skates wouldn't fit me, and he said he didn't want to have to ride my bike in his socks, so I think we're both just hoping that we don't encounter any more wayward shopping carts out galivanting about the neighborhood.
*Mark would like to add that, though Meijer is only "a few blocks away," he pushed the cart for 3 miles.
It is finally, finally really starting to feel like spring in Michigan. No matter how long I end up living here, I will never think this is normal weather. Spring is supposed to start in March, darn it. At my birthday. That is the rule. The state of Michigan is apparently unaware of this, and I disapprove.
But today was actually nice and sunny and above 50 degrees. Since Thursday is one of my free afternoons, when it got to be 5:00 and Mark was officially done working, I suggested/demanded that we go outside to be active. So for the first time in about 6 months, I got out my bike, Mark got out his skates, and away we went on the recreation path that runs right past our apartment complex.
I had promised Mark, who was working much harder on his skates than I on my bike, that we would only be out for about half an hour. When we started retracing our path back towards home, though, we came upon a shopping cart, sitting in the middle of an intersection on the path. How it got there we have no idea. The handle proclaimed it to be from Meijer, though, which is only a few blocks away.*
There's something you have to understand about Mark. He hates seeing shopping carts not put away. Really hates it. So he decided he would push the shopping cart while on his rollerblades. He pushed it all the way to the end of the paved part of the path, only to discover that the path didn't curve the direction he thought it would, so he had to turn around and push it all the way back out to the main street, whereupon we immediately set off for Meijer. I have no doubt that we, or rather, Mark, attracted all kinds of odd looks rolling down the sidewalk that way. Mark skated directly up to the door of Meijer, deposited his cart, and skated off, much to the confusion of the employee standing there.
When I inquired as to whether he felt exercised after our outing, he proclaimed that next time, I could skate and push the cart while he rode the bike. I pointed out that his skates wouldn't fit me, and he said he didn't want to have to ride my bike in his socks, so I think we're both just hoping that we don't encounter any more wayward shopping carts out galivanting about the neighborhood.
*Mark would like to add that, though Meijer is only "a few blocks away," he pushed the cart for 3 miles.
