Phases

I'm sitting here at the computer, at ten-ish pm, eating kettle corn and drinking hot cocoa. Kettle corn was a phase Nate and I went through a few years ago. We bought all the different brands to try to figure out which kind we liked best. Jolly Time Kettlemania in case you are dying to know. Sharing a bowl of kettle corn was an evening ritual. But it wasn't always kettle corn.

For awhile it was David Letterman. We watched David Letterman every night before bed. We particularly enjoyed the top ten list, and "Is this Anything?". There was the Yatzee era. That was a fun one, back when we were super poor and all alone in the Great White North. We would put little Tyler to bed, shut off the tv, and roll the dice. I think we also played a little bit of Phase Ten in there too. A couple of years ago was the Star Wars Galaxies phase. I don't like to admit that I have a past tainted by gaming, but I could MMORPG with the best of them. Ok, maybe not the best of them, but I pulled some pretty late nights. It was fun to share one of Nate's interests with him. In a weird(nerdy) kind of way, it was bonding.

One summer, we would put the kids to bed and take tall glasses of ice water out on to the back deck. We would sit there chatting, staring at the stars. Nate would point out constellations, and I would nod and pretend that I could see them. Another year, we made coffee shakes in the blender before bed, never just a small glass, always the biggest cup we could find.

But we are back to the kettle corn, thanks to the Boy Scouts, who are fund raising this month. We purchased a big box and are quickly depleting it. This time we are eating it side by side, on separate computers. One of us with headphones on, winning a virtual WWII, the other browsing blogs and message boards.

I wonder what the next phase will be...