I never post from work but last night I prepared a detailed summary of my successes and failures during my Monday trip to Saratoga. After concluding my work I tried to post and found that the Verizon server had been hit by lightning. Not only did I fail to post, but I also lost my work.

The bottom line is that "A bad day at the track beats a good day of working." Who said that? Was it Groucho Marx?

I never post from work but... Today when I woke up Skipper wanted some milk. I trudged downstairs - no sippy cups! I went upstairs and found one under his bed. I went downstairs and cleaned the sippy cup while putting on the coffee. I poured the coffee - no sugar for Sarah! I got in the shower - no soap! What an awful morning!

Today at lunchtime I plan to drive to Stop and Shop to buy sippy cups for Skipper, sugar for Sarah, and soap for showering.

Today I packed a lunch for work. Bologna and cheese on white with Dijon mustard. Two of them. They were OK but I spent the whole afternoon thinking about fish, especially during a meeting that never seemed to end. So on the way home, I bought a piece of halibut at Whole Foods. The fish special of the week - $9.99 a pound. This still seems outrageous to me, but when you've spent the whole afternoon thinking about fish, it is time to treat yourself.

The previous night I read a long article in the New Yorker about Murphy's Cheese shop in Greenwich Village and the movement toward inserting a cheese course at the "with it" restaurants and homes (apartments) in Manhattan. So I bought a small piece of Provolone cheese.

I promised the boys that if they ate all their peas they wouldn't have to eat any fish. For them, I also made Annie's macaroni and cheese, corn on the cob, and fresh french bread. This was preceded by a cheese course of provolone and Cheddar gold fish. I grilled the halibut outside.

The boys never ate their cheese course (except for the goldfish) or halibut or peas. They stuffed themselves with macaroni, bread, and a little corn. Sarah and I cleaned our plates, a rare occurrence for Sarah, the usual for me. I also had a margarita. A good start to the weekend.

The days are getting shorter. Today we were going to go to what we call "the big green field." But by the time we had dinner and thought about getting organized the sun was setting and Henry had no clothes on. Maybe tomorrow.

A brief synopsis of the trip to St. Louis follows.

Flying was boring. Henry even fell asleep while we were landing in Chicago. More exciting was the moving sidewalk at Midway Airport, the baggage carousels, and especially the bus trip in the Budget van from the St. Louis airport to the rental depot. It was the boys' first trip in a vehicle without wearing a seat belt. Why don't the vans have seat belts?

The St. Louis Zoo is bigger than Roger Williams Park. You need to take a train to get around. Riding the train was more interesting than looking at sleeping hippos.

The Burger Kings in the St. Louis area had run out of Spiderman toys. This was a big disappointment. The playground equipment at the local parks was very tame compared to what we have around here.

The toilets on the flight back were very smelly and Skipper refused to go. He almost exploded when we landed in Baltimore.

It was good to get home.

We're back. The boys behaved slightly better than expected. Henry tells me he would prefer not to fly again because he does not like to fasten his seat belt.

We're going to St. Louis tomorrow. The boys' first flight. It was hard getting them to sleep tonight. We'll be back Monday.

Today we did go to the beach. I'm on vacation. But the event of the day was our trip to Burger King. Henry especially and also Skipper, are fascinated by Spiderman. We rented Spiderman 1. Skipper got scared after 10 minutes and Henry bored after a half hour, but they nevertheless are intrigued by the character. Burger King's free toys of the month are Spiderman toys. Last week we got the Spiderman binoculars which are useless, but today we got both the Spiderman wrist water pistol and the Spiderman stopwatch. Skipper got the wrist water gun. It fastens to his wrist like a watch and allows him to run around at a playground or elsewhere unencumbered by holding on to a gun, yet remain armed for any special emergencies which require a quick shot of water to a tormenter or victim. Henry got the stopwatch which clips to his belt (or underwear). It is digital and records accurately (I presume) to a 100th of a second. The buttons are easy for him to push and allow him to start and stop the watch as well as recycle to zero. Along with the toys they got a hamburger, french fries and a drink for $2.49. Quite a deal. Especially the stopwatch, since I've never seen anything at that price level which works so well. Only in America.

Today we were all prepared to head for the beach. The pea soup forecast for the morning was expected to clear off by the afternoon. I took the boys grocery shopping in the late morning. As we came out of the supermarket, it started to rain and it continued until after 4 in the afternoon. So much for the beach and another nail in the coffin of the weather forecasting profession. Around 7, and after our Norwegian meatball dinner, we headed to the nearest playground - known as the baby park. There were a surprising number of children and parents there for that time of day, as many as 15 children. I guess others had been cooped up inside all day. As the boys started to play, I realized they were the oldest children there. The others were all toddlers, barely able to wobble around from one place to another. Again, I was happy and sad. No more diapers - and the end in sight of our frequent trips to the baby park.