Day #21: Pride

It's late.  Post is due in less than an hour.  And I've been on the move for the past 14.  In that time, we drove and then shuttled to downtown Hillcrest with a pack from the Pippin cast (aka "Pipsters") and roamed both sides of the parade route for over two hours handing out promo business cards.  Our Pippin himself, already 6' 3", wore 5-inch stiletto pumps for this activity, which got us exactly the kind of attention you want at the Pride Parade.  It was quickly apparent that only Pippin and myself were up for selling ourselves to people in gold shorts and duct tape over their boobs, and we developed a pitch that included lines like "Fun, fierce, fabulous, Fosse and lots of other 'F' words!" and "We've got magic to do...some of it on stripper poles!" and "You know you love jazz hands!"  This approach actually worked, and we did manage to distribute nearly 1,000 cards during that time though I got a little hoarse and sweated like the lead singer in a rhumba band.

Afterward, we jumped straight in the car and drove to Encinitas, where we fetched Jarrah from her sleepover at Joy's, and then continued to the OC, where my brother's family is visiting from the Bay Area and my sister's from LA.  Only, for some reason the traffic was at Thanksgiving threat levels, and it took forever.  We even missed the beach trip attended by the entire extended family, but truthfully, we'd had enough sun for the day.  They returned to find us by the pool--and Jarrah in it--and soon she was joined by Thomas, Stella and Lilah, who was totally grooving on swimming with the big kids and grinned through her chattering teeth (that pool's not heated.)

My folks headed out to a fancy party, but the rest of us had dinner at Sharkey's, a Mexican place David and I like that soon became a favorite of the entire crew.  After that, we had some hang-out time and some of my Mom's lemon cake before Lilah's parents had to take her home and the rest of us undertook a very dark walk to the park to play zombies.

By the time we were ready to leave, Jarrah was curled up on the floor waiting to be carried to the car, and I started nodding off during the drive, determined to stay awake to listen to a fascinating "This American Life" account of an expat living in a remote Manchurian village.  And I did.

Home.  Looking forward to sleep after a jam-packed day.