a funny day at the pier

So, this weekend is one of the last free weekends we have before the arrival (into the outside world) of Babykins. I thought it might be nice to go to LA and Santa Barbara for a mini-break, one last little bit of travel and visiting friends before we become parents (gasp!) with a tiny baby. Unfortunately, it rained a lot (for here) so we decided the trip would not be that much fun, although it would mean escaping the increasingly loud singing of the Mexican contractors working on the house next door (they are a very happy bunch, but the singing and yelling and chitter-chatter has begun to grate on my nerves. I don't think this has anything to do with the facts that I am 8.5 months pregnant and home for most of the day everyday while they are working...). Not that we were planning a bevy of outdoor activities, but the thought of driving in LA traffic (there is always traffic in LA) in the rain was not relaxing and would defeat the purpose of the mini-break (to relax and enjoy ourselves).

Instead we stayed home and got a few more projects done, got some exercise and had a little fun. Friday night I made lasagna, pretty much from the recipe in The Joy of Cooking. While it was baking, we went for a little walk around Tuscany! (this is the name of our subdivision, without exclamation point, and it makes me feel a little happier about living in a mediocre housing tract to mock its ridiculously grandiose name. I guess the houses are stucco and have red tile roofs, but I bet no where in real Tuscany do residents get letters from a HOA telling them to remove dead cacti from their front yards because "this is in violation of the Conditions, Covenants and Restrictions of your association". Clearly they don't know all my time and energy are devoted to (growing a baby AND) trying to make the inside of my house more like Tuscany and less like Taos...) While walking I examined everyone's yards, a) trying to find other yards that may be contributing to making Tuscany  a less "pleasant place to live" and b)trying to figure out whose yards were the most fantastic, from an HOA perspective (the ones with fake grass and potted impatience), and deciding if these belonged to board members so I could drop my dead cacti off there when we finally do remove them (sometime after removing the underground wiring that the previous owners ingeniously installed right next to the base of the plants, that I found/almost electrocuted myself by digging up when I did, in a burst of energy (no pun intended), attempt cacti relocation a few weeks ago).

Saturday we did one of my favorite things: got donuts for breakfast :)
I love donuts. I love donuts a lot. Nothing makes me more sad than a bad or stale donut. So, happily we went to Hill Street Donuts in Oceanside where there are only tasty, fresh donuts to be had. I have to say, as much as I like Carlsbad, they are home to the worst donuts. If you want good donuts they have to be imported from Vista or Oceanside or even Cardiff, or you can travel to these locations under the guise of something, like a walk at the pier. In fact, this is what we did after eating our yummy, fluffy donuts and fritters.

It was not a nice day in the typical sense because of the wind and impending rain, but I always like to go walk at the ocean to feel the wind and smell the ocean smell. The water was only 58 degrees, so I felt really bad for the poor kids doing the life guard tryouts in Speedos (I was wearing a long sleeve shirt, sweatshirt and jacket), they were the brightest pink I have ever seen a human be while doing their swimming test. There weren't as many people fishing off the pier as usual, but there were lots of brown pelicans, and they were not very nice. Usually, they just hang around looking for some left over, or unattended bait to snack on, but they were very aggressive - I saw one chase a little girl out of the way so it could eat the fish pieces she, her brother & father were baiting their lobster traps with.

At the end of the pier there is a restaurant, and as we walked around the corner of the restaurant I saw a pelican standing in the middle of the walk way (restaurant on one side, 20 foot drop to the ocean on other side) with its wings hanging out, and said to Shandiz "that pelican doesn' t look very nice." He clearly thought it was just my bird paranoia (to clarify - I am not scared of all birds, just when they try to make contact with me or my food) and said it was fine UNTIL the pelican started flapping its wings and jabbing its head in our direction. As we tried to ease around the side of it, it flew a few feet off the pier and came at us, so naturally Shandiz did what he does when I am in danger from a wild creature (this has happened on 2 other occasions, 1) snokling on our honeymoon when a large eel came out of a hole, and 2) when we were looking at houses and a 3-4 foot gopher snake slithered across our path), he jumps in front of me and pushes me back (it really is endearing because  he doesn't realize he did anything until I comment on it after we are 'out of danger').
However, this time he had a little more in store for the pelican (I so wish I had a little video or dramatic recreation, I just don't think I will be able to do it justice in words) When the pelican was still coming at us, he kind of jumped at it with one leg (I am crying as I type, replaying the image in my mind) while simultaneously judo chopping at it, and repeated this action until we had safely made it around the pelican and could continue on down the pier. Oh, I love him.