the gregarious homebody


Friday, June 13, 2008

B and P

natalie dee.com
I've been absent awhile because, frankly, there's been nothing interesting or engaging to write about. Needless to say, the kids are home for the summer! My days consist of throwing food to the savages, cleaning up after the savages, and yelling at the savages. I love my kids, but there really should be a halfway house between school and home when the summer starts. They need to get used to having no structure and I need to gear up to have them here. ALL THE TIME.

That being said, I was looking forward to the only tiny little vacation we had planned this year. M is horse-crazy and I am always stoking my dreams of living on a little farm, so we decided to go to Lancaster County and stay at horse farm B & B. Friends of ours had stayed at an Amish farm (in some pretty nice modern digs, not attached to the family's farmhouse) and had a great time helping out with some light chores--collecting eggs, feeding the animals--and eating a traditional country breakfast in the family's home. I love this kind of experience because you get all the good stuff about a rural life with none of the heavy lifting.

Anyway, we left on the hottest day of the year so far, with M about to burst with excitement about seeing the foals that had just been born a few weeks before and S, though he's nursing a pretty yucky cough, excited about going to Hershey Park the next day. Handsome Husband was just glad to not be at work.

What we found when we got there was a lovely but extremely cluttered farm with poorly cared-for horses and a house that smelled like cat pee.

It was horrible. We walked into the kitchen (which was about 100 degrees with fans blowing around) and a wall of cat stink hit us. Did I mention that the owners also breed Himalayans?

Thank god the owners weren't there (we were greeted by someone I guess was the chambermaid--who knows? She never introduced herself) because there was NO mistaking my HOLY SHIT expression. All I could think of was that we were paying $175 a night for CAT PISS?!

We decided to walk around a local CVS until the owner gets back so we can check in (a completely charmless corporate hotel is sounding better and better, isn't it?) and I am freaking out inside. Where do I start? All I could think was it's 98 fucking degrees and, walking past some of the guest cottages they have on the property, I noticed some windows open. Why is this bad? Because it's 98 fucking degrees outside and windows should be closed if there is air conditioning on. OH. MY. GOD. Not only is there a cat pee smell that could peel wallpaper, THERE IS NO AIR CONDITIONING!

Shockingly (if you know him), HH was the picture of calm. I'm all "should we go back?! WHAT are WE GOING TO DO?? and he just says "Let's just see."

Thankfully, the room was lovely and yes, it was air conditioned with a window unit. The bathroom, although carpetted, was nice and everything was very clean. Jesus was EVERYWHERE in the room, but hey, the owner is a Mennonite minister, so who am I to judge?

So we all breathe a sigh of relief and S and I lie down on our beds. His cough seems to have gotten progressively worse and he falls asleep almost immediately. S NEVER naps. He's 12 years old and, even when dog-tired, he figures he's missing out on something if he's sleeping. But maybe a nap will make it better. So I fall asleep too because, after all, I am The Grand Napmaster. M goes outside to see the horses and HH reads. All is good.

Then I wake up. My leg on the side that I have been sleeping is covered in little tiny itchy bumps. S is coughing his head off, M is telling us that the horses aren't cleaned up after properly so they eat their own poop, and HH is looking concerned about S's cough. And I swear I smell cat pee.

LONG story short, we enjoyed a nice dinner at a Philly chain called Iron Hill Brewery (highly recommend!), went to see the new Adam Sandler movie (stoopid but funny--sort of recommend), went back to the B & P. We left the next morning to come home because poor S now had a fever AND a nasty cough and I can smell cat pee. No Hershey Park. No gathering of eggs. No rural bliss. Not even a fucking breakfast because who can eat in a dining room that smells like cat pee?

As M said on the ride back home,



"Best vacation EVER."



5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Whoa! Once that cat pee smell gets in your nose hairs it just doesn't get out! Sounds like my 3 day camping in the Pine Barrens, including multiple daily tick checks (yes, both kinds all over the place) was a better option. Glad M had a great time but I'm not sure I'd solicit her input in planning the next vaca. Thanks for the entertaining distraction!

Regardez Moi said...

UGH. Cat pee. Poor thing.

Also - I've been to Iron Hill Brewery! Woop woop!

The Handsome Husband said...

I would rather have to check for ticks in the rectal region than smell cat pee.

jen said...

I feel the need to comment about my own post because my friend Lynn, who is a nurse, told me today that she thinks the little bumps on my body from the B & B are from BEDBUGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

That's exactly what I thought they were! In fact, I was surprised you didn't follow that line up w/that diagnosis. I have a staff person who now always checks the temp at which hotels wash their linens b/c he had that happen once.....not to make you paranoid.

And to HH, I didn't do rectal checks. I figure if a tick had the fortitude to migrate in that direction, more power to him/her.

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