Outer Banks, Day Four (Monday, 6/2)

Read Day Three here.
Read Day Two here.
Read Day One here.

Sadly, Mary Anne wasn’t feeling very well this morning. Gracie, Jen, Clair, and I headed down to the beach to check things out. Gracie, as always, wanted to build a sand castle. Clair, meanwhile, dug a giant hole. I got in the water, even though it could only be described as heart-stoppingly cold. Yes, I went in all the way; my head was submerged. Hey, if I’m at the beach, I’m getting in the water.

We went back to the beach house after and got ready to climb into the hot tub, or as Gracie likes to call it, the hot pool. When I removed the cover, there was a small frog sitting on the control panel. Gracie immediately ran up and picked him up (she’s not afraid of critters, just motorcycles).

Mary Anne was feeling better, so we decided to walk down to the community pool. Mom had assured me that we didn’t need a pass to get in, despite the signs to the contrary. Immediately upon arrival, we were carded. Embarrassed, I explained that my mother was absolutely certain that we wouldn’t need the pool pass and that she had never needed it last year. The guy smiled and said, “I’m not always here.”

After the hot pool, we all got showered and changed, and then we faced a minor meltdown. Gracie hadn’t brought the right shirt to match with her green shorts. Needless to say, after the Emma incident in Ocean City, I wasn’t about to drive eight hours home and eight hours back for a shirt. She dealt with it. We discovered around this point that Mary takes even longer showers than Jen and I do. We found this satisfying.

We all decided to order pizza for dinner. Mom called the pizza shop and ordered three large pizzas with a few toppings, nothing fancy. “That will be $56.” Hmmm. On second thought, cancel that order. We’ll grill. Thanks anyway.

While we waited for the food to cook, Gracie and the women played cards. Gracie chose to play Go Fish, since we were at the beach. Around that time, I was checking out a decorative blanket with the lighthouses of North Carolina on it. I noticed on called Bald Head. So I called to my Dad, “Dad, there’s a lighthouse named after you!” He came up and looked at the blanket and said, “Yep, and it’s the shortest lighthouse on the east coast.”

After dinner, Gracie wanted to swing. Mary Anne and I took her down to the swingset, and my Dad showed up. Gracie dared him to swing on the monkey bars. My Dad never steps down from a challenge. He kicked off his docksiders, grabbed the monkey bars, and threw his legs into air, shoveling a fair amount of sand into his eyes in the process. When he regained his sight, he tried again. This time, he admirably held on to the monkey bars with the tops of his feet. Until they slipped. Presumably from the sand. In what has to be one of the funniest things I have ever seen (because he was OK), he landed squarely on his back, in the exact same position he had been in while hanging.

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