On the Road with Alarm Clock Boy & Gossip Girl

Somehow, it can't officially be considered "summer" without the Summer Vacation -- the kind of grueling marathon of enforced family togetherness we undertake yearly in an effort to stockpile Family Memories. This year's iteration was a 1700+ mile roundtrip in the trusty family minivan... or as my daughter thinks of it, 30 hours of captive audience.

I refer to her as Gossip Girl in the title in part to establish my hipster bona fides; you can see how tuned in I am to what the Youngsters are watching on the television nowadays. In addition, while my girl doesn't exactly gossip (though she's definitely not above tattling), she does serve as the near-constant voiceover narrator of our daily program.

Once as we were observing our daily craft time, a tradition we share with mental institutions, I sought to stem the word flow with a suggestion that she need not comment in detail on each individual color choice; she just smiled sweetly and responded, "But I like talking."

Since our vacation plan basically boiled down to a trip to North Carolina (state motto: "We Ain't Messin' Around with None of that 'Dry Heat' Nonsense"), it wasn't like we could just tell her to go play outside, unless we wanted to retrieve her with a sponge. Apart from the daily beach time, most of our outside time was confined to dashes to/from the van.

On the way back from the beach, we did make our now-apparently-traditional stop at Hersheypark, probably the original if not the only intersection between choocolate and roller coasters. I wrote a piece not long ago (well, OK, it was quite a while back; I should more honestly say "not many ago") about how I feel like I'm putting money much more in perspective... but the Vacation Trip and in particular the Theme Park Experience will definitely test you on that. It may just be me, but I find I really have to totally disengage that gear in my brain that triggers the "How much did you say this is?" flag. The admission gate, the concessions, the hotel desk, and of course the gas pump afforded me numerous, frequent opportunities to almost literally put my money where my mouth was (although I have to say that this felt worth every penny).

Perhaps it's unique to my family, but I think we take a sort of perverse pleasure when things go wrong. My parents can (and will) list for you every faulty appliance, lemony auto purchase, and grueling customer service experience they've ever had. And we welcomed our niece to that fraternity; she waited for close to an hour in line for one of Hershey's water rides... when she finally reached the top, they closed the waterpark because there was a thunderstorm warning. Not that it did, in fact, rain whatsoever.

But the real Hershey shocker for me came the next day. We had tried to squeeze the max out of her Hersheypark experience; by the time we reached the hotel and got the kids down, it was 90+ minutes past their bedtime. And the next morning, at precisely 7:00.0 AM... nothing whatsoever happened.

Yes, the Amazing Alarm Clock Boy -- extensively chronicled over the years in this space -- experienced chronometer malfunction, finally appearing at my bedside to remark (in a tone that can only be described as bewildered): "Dad, it's 7:51, dad!"

So make the change in your scorecards; the list is back down to the traditional Death and Taxes.