Yesterday ColtonColton aka: Moose, Duece, Colt, CJ
Age: 3
Favorite Word: Fart
Hobbies:  Playing in the dirt, setting off fire alarms at preschool and bossing people around.
Best Qualities:  The sweetest disposition this side of the Mississippi. and I went down to a little pizza joint in Del Mar.  They have a fabulous salad that I recently discovered and I can’t get enough of it. I'm not kidding, I have had it four days in a row.  It is a chopped salad and the lettuce is so crunchy and there is chopped basil in it and chicken and fresh avocado and tomatoes and garbanzo beans.  It is ridiculous. 

Any who how, that isn’t my point.  My point is the ensuing conversation.  Colt and I sat down on the bar stools that line the front window so we could look out to the ocean and the train tracks.  Is there anything more exciting than a slice of pizza and a train sighting?

There are four stools.  We took two.  In hindsight I wish I’d had two blowup dolls shoved in my over-sized bag so that I could have taken the other two.  Just as we began to eat Mr. California walks in. Jeans, button up shirt, nice shoes, phone attached to his hip and exuding dork from his every pore.

Mr. California: (Loudly and thinking is being suave and debonair) Is this seat taken? 

I could tell immediately he was one of “those” guys.  The kind that was looking for attention and going to annoy the crap out of me.

Me: (With a fake smile) No, it’s all yours.

He is now sitting on one side of Colton and I am on the other. Which means I am all but forced to look at him. I immediately turn all of my attention to Colt at this point in hopes that Mr. California will not have a single open moment to begin conversation.  I can feel him look at me over and over and I refuse to look up.  Apparently frustrated, he tries a new method.

Mr. California: (On his cell phone and speaking loudly) Hey Bob.  You know that 3.1 MILLION dollar house I looked at the other day?  (He looks over at this point to see if I am paying attention.  I am making every effort to continue talking to Colton and appear as if I'm not. So he gets louder.) Yeah that’s the one.  I want you to put a bid on it.  Make it 2.9 million and ask if the Corvette in the driveway comes with it. (Apparently he thinks the Corvette comment is hysterical, because at this point he begins guffawing.)

Holy dweeb-o-rama Batman.  I have now turned my back on my own child I am so desperate not to make ANY eye contact.  Then, someone on the other side of the restaurant knocks their drink onto the ground and in one horrible slip of concentration I look up.  Mr. California jumps at the opportunity.

Mr. California: How old is your son.

Me: (Shit and damn!) He’s three. (I immediately dive back into Colton, but he is not giving up.)

Mr. California: I have two girls.

Me: That’s great. (Notice, there is no question being asked to further conversation?  He doesn’t.)

Mr. California: They are four and two.

Me:  (Smiling fakely) That’s a fun age. (Still no question and I am not making eye contact.  Clear indications that I have no desire to continue this conversation.)

Mr. California: (With GREAT pride) My four year old just wrapped her first movie.

Me: (Willing my eyes not to roll) Wow.

It is at this point that I abandon my half eaten salad, grab Colt’s leftover pizza and walk out the door to the park.  A girl can only take so much and you just know I was about to get a thirty minute rundown on the movie and what celebrities he is now “friend’s” with.  I am still bitter about the other half of the salad I had to leave behind. If I go five days in a row do you think the sixteen year old behind the counter is going to think I am some stalking cougar?