22 Comments

• 1. Simon  |  August 22nd, 2006 at 11:43 pm

  The last vacation I took was two weeks in March after my wife accidentally gave birth to our son at home on our nearly-new $1800 mattress while 6 uniformed men paraded around our bedroom without the good grace to remove their snow infested boots. There was some humour in the situation after the fact, not to mention the ambulance blew a fuse on the way to the hospital because the driver forgot to take the E-brake off, but it was more tense than funny at the time.

  And there’s no air conditioning in our house, so we seek respite in the basement on hot nights. Hope you and Gloria parted amicably wtihout having to cite irreconcilable differences.

• 2. mom on a wire  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 12:18 am

  Where in the world did you go? This is all very mysterious.

• 3. geogirl  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 6:47 am

  Welcome Back Jenn!

  Gloria wasn’t right for you anyway.

• 4. ChristyD  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 10:29 am

  So… Lombard Street. Were you visiting San Francisco? Very mysterious indeed.

• 5. Tree  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 10:45 am

  Good to know you’re back. Take some time to relaaaaax. Aaaaaah, that’s better! Now email me!
  ;)

• 6. Andrea S.  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 10:54 am

  Gloria didn’t treat you right. If she truly cared, she would have adopted a more respectful tone. Besides, there’s something to be said for driving off the map, finding side roads and taking the scenic route. She didn’t appreciate that about you. Plus, there’s no guarantee if someone else were driving she wouldn’t hook up with them and go somewhere without you. She was untrustworthy. You’re far better off. You deserve someone who says, “Well, this street is interesting,” instead of “ReCALCulating,” at you all the time. Who wants to live with someone so uptight and unspontaneous?

• 7. Kris  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 11:43 am

  hmmm, I’m guessing North Carolina… maybe into the Raleigh Airport, but I also get a feeling for Asheville……

  again, hmmm

• 8. sweetney  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 11:51 am

  sniff. i miss Gloria already.

• 9. Lori  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 11:55 am

  Hmmm indeed. Apparently you have achieved celebrity status in my mind as I feel I have the right to know things like where you travel and what you do! Does that make me “stalkarazzi??”

• 10. Another Jen  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 12:10 pm

  I’m also placing my bet at San Francisco, Lombard being that famed “crookedest street in the world.”

  Dumb thing to be famous for, when you think about it.

• 11. Kirsten in SF  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 2:11 pm

  Nope, couldn’t be San Francisco, there isn’t a freight railroad anywhere near Lombard Street! We have always thought it odd theat everyone wants to see the crooked part of Lombard- only one block is curvy, but it is brick paved and kinda charming….

  I don’t have a vacation story for this year, because this week was supposed to be our vacation, but instead I have a 13 y/o with Strep and two cabin crazy siblings that are keeping me jumping, especially if they happen to cough. Sigh. We should have been in Disneyland :>( I think there might be funny stories from previous vacations, but I am wayyyyy too tired to remember them right now….

  I am glad you dumped Gloria, she was a bad influence….

• 12. Megan  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 6:30 pm

  For the past two vacations my husband and I have excellent flights TO our destination and pure, screaming hell on the way home. Generally, we end up waiting 6 hours past the time we were supposed to be leaving to actually get on a plane, making us so incredibly late for the next plane that we sprint like maniacs across the Dallas airport (both times) only to discover that the next plane has also been delayed like 6 hours. And it slowly starts to sink in how we could have driven home, taken the bus home, or even ridden a burro home and still been back before we even got off the ground on the connecting flight.

• 13. Jackie  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 6:56 pm

  Vacation this year started in Reston, VA visiting dad and the Reston Zoo. On to North Carolina to spend 10 days with the hubby’s family. Very nice. Until the drive home: 8 hours with a 3 year old and an almost 1 year old who hate the car, in a thunderstorm with the Wiggles Live DVD being played to drown out their cries. Back on the homefront, the girls not sleeping by themselves anymore and the little one going through a 6 week bout of e coli. We will never go on vacation again. PS - wash your hands and anything that touches anything of yours after visiting a petting zoo!!

• 14. Mom of Two Brooklyn Babes  |  August 23rd, 2006 at 10:01 pm

  We are on vacation now, near the sea.

  Our two urban children — who unflappably navigate subways and buses with us — are so unaccustomed to driving that they projectile vomited in UNISON in our rental car on the way here. It was AWFUL: a 6-yr-old and a 1-yr-old hurling in the back of a brand-new Malibu because the experience of being strapped in a car seat, hurtling along at 60 mph in a metallic instrument not unlike a giant soup can, terrified them.

  Be glad you were stuck with Gloria and not two retching metro-tots.

• 15. moxiemomma  |  August 24th, 2006 at 7:39 pm

  fie upon that damnable gloria putnam smith! good riddance.

  since we haven’t had a vacation in oh, say, a hundred years, the very idea of a vacation is hilarity in my book.

• 16. Amy  |  August 24th, 2006 at 11:13 pm

  I recently took a trip where we recieved instructions from a nice Australian TomTom. He was very courtious and always gave plenty of warning for any turn. “In 800 yards, take the exit.” “In 500 yards, take the exit.” “In 100 feet, take the exit.” “Take the exit.” He was somewhat demanding, and he did give you the silent treatment if you didn’t listen to him, but forgiveness was swift. He never spoke in a peevish voice to remonstrate you for a missed turn.

  Perhaps your next trip should be with TomTom.

  oh and you haven’t felt true trip horror until you’ve driven 2 days from ID to southern CA with five children and a peevish husband.

• 17. Kelly S.  |  August 25th, 2006 at 1:49 am

  Most recent vacation, in July — 4 nights in Las Vegas with 2 small children under age 5. The 4-year-old had a blast and can’t wait to go back. The 19-month-old…not so much. And no comments about being the sort to drag children through smoky casinos at 3am…most nights we were in bed by 11.

• 18. Shellie  |  August 25th, 2006 at 6:29 am

  Try the train for 24 hours with six kids and a peevish husband. Fun Stuff….

• 19. Jen  |  August 25th, 2006 at 10:36 am

  Baltimore, perhaps?

  You’re a brave woman to even try that. I get flustered when I see the street that I’m supposed to turn onto, let alone when someone tells me where things are.

  Maybe that’s why I’m perpetually lost.

• 20. J  |  August 25th, 2006 at 3:18 pm

  Last summer visiting friends in Charleston, the baby, then four months old, perched upon his Daddy’s lap, as we sit in their lovely, well appointed sitting room. Suddenly and without warning a giant fountain of poop shoots up the back of the baby’s diaper and makes a perfect arc, as it rains like Old Faithful all over my husband and our friend’s really old Oriental rug. Nary a drop of poop on the baby though.

• 21. Other blogs&hellip  |  August 25th, 2006 at 9:23 pm

  Blogging Baby Sleepover for Friday August 25

  Filed under: Blogs You know, in general I try to introduce lesser-known parenting blogs here. Everyone

• 22. Vikki  |  September 5th, 2006 at 2:08 pm

  Well, I just returned from a great trip to Portugal and I did not have to deal with Gloria Putnam Smith. I did, however, have to deal with a 17 month old who hates to be in a stroller, hates to hold hands (in fact, bites hands) and is practicing immobility for her future in civil disobedience.

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