Part Three of Joan & Amy's Adventures in San Diego: The Couch Tour

My plan of sitting in long intervals on Savannah and Sydney's couch isn't turning out the way I envisioned. "Well...that was great," Joan exclaimed, leaping up, completely traumatized by her recent introduction to "Shameless" (We watched "Beauty & the Beast" afterwards to balance it out). "Let's go to the store for the ingredients to make hot dog soup and venison strudel for the girls." I frowned. This would require walking. With groceries.  Joan handed me my empty backpack and off we trekked. "This certainly isn't like Belle carrying French bread in her basket," I grumbled a half hour later, stuffing 28 ounce cans of crushed tomatoes in my bag. "You're carrying the ten pound bag of potatoes," I informed Joan. Turns out her backpack full of spuds and marshmallows was no match for my backpack full of sparkling water, double-stuffed Oreos,  canned tomatoes, coffee, cherries, and a pound of butter. A half a mile (up hill) later, I crawled back to the couch.

"Let's take in a game," Savannah said, tugging me back off the couch. "Oh...are we driving?" I asked, happily surprised. "Sort of," she answered. We ended up parking at the top of a hillside park, a ka-zillion blocks from the stadium.  You see where this is going. It was a great game. My left knee was on the Jumbo-tron. And then, as the old saying goes, what walked downhill to the stadium must eventually stagger, breathless and whiny, uphill in the dark. Oh...and fall in a parking lot hole before getting in the car. But I DID eventually make it back to the couch.

"Farmer's Market!" the girls exclaimed. "Isn't that healthy food?" I asked cautiously. Yes. Yes, it was. Again, the farmer's market was perched at the pinnacle of a majestic hill, flowing like a rushing waterfall of organic goodness. Joan immediately bought an almond loaf the size of her forearm and nibbled away while I waded systematically through the four city blocks worth of free samples. Lemon pomegranate olive oil was pretty tasty. Tamponade, a fancy word for diced olives, was pleasant. I was doing okay until I made the fatal mistake of not trusting my tried-and-true snacking instincts and was coerced into sampling a green tea smoothie. Texture. Taste. Philosophical bent. ALL bad. I gagged. Retched. And staggered away. Now gun-shy to snacking. Shockingly, the kale people lured me in. They poo-poo-ed my newly-developed aversion to green things. I learned that the addition of salt and vinegar could jazz up a turnip or, in the case of kale, slightly crispy cardboard. At the bottom of the hill was the Midway AND the iconic World War II Kissing Statue. At the TOP of the hill was our parked car. "I'm thinking of a word," I muttered to Joan, leaning into the 45 degree angle as we trudged up the hill. "How many letters?" she asked. I squinted against the glare of the skin-scorching sun. "Four," I panted as Savannah, Sydney, and their friend Kasey happily scampered ahead. "What's it start with?" Joan wondered. "I'll give you the first TWO letters," I said generously, hitting a plateau only to be faced with yet ANOTHER daunting incline. "F-U!" I screamed.

I finally made it back to my beloved couch. I had only been briefly re-introduced to my native habitat when, out of the corner of my eye (Glasses-wearers, you should get this...) in the frighteningly indistinct space running along my glasses stem and cheek, a fuzzy grapefruit-sized spider raced towards me. Charged like a bull. I did what any other reasonable person would do under these circumstances. I emitted a long moan of deep despair and then log-rolled off the couch. I was going to have to rethink my co-dependent relationship with my couch.