Pirates of the Charles River

So there are a number of things I'm not spectacular at. Obviously, one is blogging. This post is an attempt to make up for that.

Another thing I've decided I'm not that good at is planning big themed dates. Cue story.

After an inspirational chat with my good friend Pam, I decided to surprise Daniel with an elaborate, all-day Saturday date. I started by making a list of the types of things Daniel likes. It went something like this:

• Hockey
• Science
• Food
• Acting/pretending 
• Pirates

After much research, I decided to combine the last three items into one super-date. Then, of course, came another list, this time naming stuff pirates do. It went something like this:

• Sailing
• Pillaging
• Feasting
• Finding treasure

I came up with what I felt were appropriate pirate-like activities for each of these four things, and I figured that everything together would fill the majority of the day without being too much (after all, I AM pregnant and lazy). All I needed was a few hours to prep everything, and we'd be set.

So on Thursday night, while Daniel was gone, I rushed around like a madwoman trying to get everything prepared. I printed a map of Waltham and the surrounding areas, and the plan was to write—in pirate speak, mind you—short clues explaining each activity and place them on the appropriate parts of the map.

But first I had to make the map look old (of course), so I tried baking it to make it brown. But it got too crisp in the toaster oven, so I printed another copy and used the regular oven. Same problem. So I, like a stubborn idiot, tried the toaster oven again, with (shockingly) the same results. Finally, after some Googling, I discovered that wetting the paper with diluted soy sauce and THEN baking it would achieve the desired results. Success! But then the edges were too pretty, so I decided to burn them. That was all fine and good, except that it made the apartment fairly smoky, so I had to light a bunch of candles to mask the smell.

Once that whole debacle was over, I made a mad dash to the grocery store to buy food for a piratey picnic—root beer, crusty bread, grapes, Goldfish crackers (hah, get it?), Cap'n Crunch (hah, get it?), and other stuff I can't remember now. I knew Daniel would be back around 8:30, and I was barely going to make it home in time to hide everything before he got home, so I hurried back as fast as I could. Only when I got home, I discovered that my key to the apartment building was GONE. As in no longer on my keychain. The stupid little ring had stretched too far, and it had fallen off, never to be seen again.

Now, I'm not proud of what happened next.

I pathetically tried to force the front door open and then frantically searched the car for the missing key. And finally, after some inappropriate words, I lost it. I flung myself over the driver's seat of the car and cried. That's when Daniel pulled into the parking lot and found me. Crying. Surrounded by mysterious grocery bags. Muttering incoherently about everything being ruined.

So then I had to tell him I was planning something. I managed to avoid telling him the what or when, but I was still not happy about the whole thing. On the plus side, he thought the apartment smelled nice because of the candles. At least I didn't have to explain why it smelled like smoke. :)

On Saturday morning, our date went off as planned. First on the schedule was sailing. We headed to the river and rented a canoe, which we paddled downstream while singing the Pirates of the Caribbean song. We also spoke like pirates to the people we passed, who found us very threatening indeed. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention we were dressed as pirates. Here's proof:

Once we reached our destination (a nice park), we dropped anchor and had our pirate picnic. All the kids on the playground totally thought we were awesome, too. That's 'cause we are. I mean, come on...

We leisurely paddled back to the canoe rental place, said goodbye to our ship, and headed off to do our next piratey thing: pillaging. But since we're opposed to actual theft and/or destruction of property, we decided to steal something from our good friends, Kyle and Vanessa, with the intention of returning it the next day at church. But the only thing we could get from their apartment was their doormat, so that's what we took.

Isn't Daniel piratey perfection? Check out that pillaging!

Anyway, after that it was time for feasting. Only it was, like, 2:00. Somehow, my all-day date had become a brief outing. I hadn't planned enough activities. But there was nothing to do about it at that point, so we went to KFC, where the plan was to get drumsticks (They seemed piratey, okay?). Only we ordered white meat, so we didn't even get drumsticks. And what we got was gross. Sadly, a feast it was not. (Sigh)

After that we went home, where Daniel found his "buried treasure" (really just candy shoved in my jewelry box and buried in our blanket bin). Then we crashed on the couch and watched a movie. And it wasn't even about pirates.

The moral of the story: Pirating cannot be planned. So don't even try.