Well, Kiss Me Clovers

I was all set to write about what a wonderful weekend I had … then I drove into work today. There’s nothing quite like a floody Monday to remind you that your weekend is over. Ah, what the heck. The weekend was still a good one.

Friday night I was offered a free ticket to go see the Eagles-Steelers preseason game. Not that I’m a big fan of the Eagles, but I am a fan of football and I love going to games. I have been to something like 15 NFL games in 6 different stadiums and thoroughly enjoyed them all. There’s something about the crowd at a game (and there’s definitely something about the crowd at a game in Philadelphia!). Being preseason, a lot of season ticket holders sold their tickets, meaning there was a lot of black and gold in that stadium. And since the game didn’t count, the belligerence level of the native Eagles fans was toned way down. As a result, there was some good natured banter back and forth amongst the lot of us, and nobody got hauled away in shackles or on a gurney.

Saturday during the day my son and I built a fort out of the couch and dining room chairs which somehow later morphed into a boat. We had a lot of fun together. Unfortunately, he had a problem staying on his best behavior when it was time to get ready to go to the babies’ momma’s house.

Saturday evening Ms N and I headed down to Atlantic City. I’ve mentioned in a prior post that I view casino time as a form of entertainment that you pay for. I plan out ahead of time how much I am willing to pay for an evening, then hope that I don’t lose everything so quickly that I am left with nothing to do. The past few times I have been there I have managed to pretty much even out the wins and losses, so I’ve left the casino with the same amount of money in my pocket as when I’ve gone in, which has been quite nice. This time around I did even better.

At Caesar’s I put $10 into one machine and on the very last spin won $20. At Trump Marina, I popped $20 into a Leprechaun-themed video slot machine, and then played it for almost an hour. When I left, I had a $100. Throughout the whole thing, the little leprechaun, in full brogue, would spurt out kitschy little sayings like “Dublin yer win!” when I’d get the double bonus. My absolute favorite was “Well, kiss me clovers!”

All in all, I left AC with my original money, plus enough to cover dinner and gas. An evening out for free … well, kiss me clovers!

Sunday the kids came back from the ex’s and spent much of the day doing laundry and other things around the house. By the end of the day, they had been outside for some bike riding and got in some TV time, plus they also did five loads of wash (the dryer broke, so I have a lot of clothes hanging around my living room right now), got the hamster cages cleaned, and my daughter’s floor is visible again. Plus they liked the dinner that I [reheated]. (Many thanks to Ms N for preparing the meal in advance!)

So this morning was a bit different. Due to some flooding, it took me an hour to drive the three miles from my house to the babysitter’s, and then I had to loop all the way around Camden to get to Philly instead of driving straight through. But this bad Monday morning was no match for the good weekend; I bounced back into a good mood pretty quickly.

After the car ride, that is. During my drive, “kiss me clovers” quickly turned to “kiss me arse” and I had plenty of suggestions for what the people who engineered the roads could do with their shillelaghs. (Dublin yer impalements!)