vacationing with my family

We're in San Diego for the weekend, taking advantage of Southwest's triumphant return to SFO ($26 one way to San Diego!). It's our first real vacation in four years, albeit just a long weekend. It's delightful (Lola says, "Best... vacation... ever!", and Iris, looking through the minibar, said, "This is heaven! Mom, can you imagine anything more like heaven than this?), but vacationing with this family is definitely unique.

The Sober Husband didn't want to eat out all weekend and found a grocery store. He proposed that we eat room temperature lentil soup and canned baked beans for dinner, served in water glasses. The man was actually surprised that I found his plan disgusting. After this reaction, he decided to heat his mass of beans in the room's coffeepot over my objections ("I may want to make some coffee, and I don't want lentil coffee").

We went for a long walk along the beach in the evening, and the children became frantic after we walked past a house where the inhabitants were watching Spongebob. "We're missing valuable TV! We need to get back to the TV!"

But on the other hand, our hotel room is lovely, and when we're lounging by the pool, there is a little flag on the back of the chairs, and if I raise that flag, a polite woman will come around and bring me a margarita. What's not to love?

Today we went to the San Diego Zoo for much of the day, and it was truly amazing. The zoo is artfully built in a canyon, so there are many levels and things tucked away hither and yon. The family favorite was the hippos' enclosure, where glass allows you to see the depths of the hippos' pond. Who knew that huge hippos float underwater like balloons, bobbing gently in the water, completely submerged but occasionally sticking their nostrils above the water level? How can something so heavy float so effortlessly? Iris and I saw bonobos playing tag and a delightful sort of monkey called a swamp monkey, and so much more.

The children are campaigning to move to San Diego. I can't argue with them. Neither the Sober Husband nor I ever intended to live in San Francisco permanently; it just happened. It would be a lot of work to move, however (sell the house! find new schools! make new friends!). And here I am an anomaly: I notice a lot more people staring at me as I walk about. I'm an example of a type found all over San Francisco: black-haired chubby girls with very good tattoos and sometimes a bit of a retro thing going (a brush of the old Bettie Page). In San Diego this phenotype does not seem common, whereas in the Bay Area, you can't swing a stick without striking several.

Now I'm dying to go to the beautiful outdoor hotel bar, but the children cannot bear to leave the television. Sigh. It's such a romantic destination here, but when the fruits of one's love are with you, you can't expect much more romance than watching cartoons.