Monday, June 16, 2008

Safety First


Well, we went to my parent's house for the weekend. A total impromptu trip. Being Father's Day, and my mom's birthday, I felt like I needed to be there. I broke it to Mr. Wizard Friday night about 8pm or so. We didn't tell the kids until about the 100th time Curious George asked if we were going to "Mammaw & Pappaw's" house. Darn smart kid, he is. We had already planned on going to a Safety Day our county was having on Saturday, so our trip would be more delayed than normal. Not to mention, I needed to call mom and give them a heads up.


So Saturday morning, we get up... unwillingly early thanks to Miss Independent. She is the alarm clock on the weekends, too bad she wasn't equipped with a snooze button. We all got up, grabbed our various breakfast faves, and slowly got out the door to head into town. George was excited, because his alias is Mr. Safety. In preschool, the school had a safety presentation for all the students. Since then, anytime I hang a towel on the oven door, I get scolded and he moves it to the fridge handle. He points out that it is a fire hazard and I need to be more careful. This among many other safety related scolds.


So we pull up, get parked, and first thing to see was a lifeline helicopter. Miss I. has a thing about 'copters when they fly overhead. Loves them, points wildly, and gets so excited. She was none too impressed by this one that is just sitting there. She did finally decide to sit down next to her brother for a picture.


Off we headed towards the major gathering of miscellaneous booths. I was secretly searching for the bicycle safety booth, to snag a free helmet for the kids. Well, then we got caught up in the SWAT vehicle, George got to climb in and look around. Miss I., still unimpressed, patiently waited. P.A. overhead lets us know there will be an extraction demo in 5 minutes... darn, still didn't see that bicycle booth. Guess we will go grab a spot to watch this.


First off, I half wondered why they were showing us how to cut the car and what first responders do. Honestly, I couldn't figure it out, I blame it on the heat. But then it occurred to me last night... now kids would know what to expect if they were the ones to be rescued. Not a half bad idea! George was asking questions all through it, he was intrigued as they rolled the roof of the car backwards to expose the victim (a life-size, true weighted dummy) and all the glass everywhere. Little Miss loved all the movement, it didn't matter to her whether the dummy made it, he shouldn't have wrecked there in the first place.


On to the State Police 'Copter. We walked up to it, but didn't seem like it was to be climbed in. No one was really standing there to say yes or no so we played it safe. The kids did get some AWESOME shades, dog tags, and a Junior Pilot sticker. I saw a good photo op with the ladder truck so we headed that way. Just then, P.A. informed us, there was to be a repelling demo from that very ladder in 5 minutes... awesome. Chose our seats wisely, we had first dibs. No bicycle booth yet.


As the insane man made it to ground level we went exploring. There was a long line for the child ID booth, let's keep moving. Next stop was the bicycle booth... and guess what - no helmets left in their size... great. Across from the bicycle booth, kids were getting to use a fire extinguisher on a fire. Way cool, unless you are Little Miss. George could barely contain the smile as he started sweeping that water back and forth at the flames. He has now proclaimed, he wants to be a firefighter. Sorry Disney, you lost out on turning my son into a chef. The force of the firemen was too great for your little rat chef.


After we picked up coloring books, firemen hats, and fridge magnets we looked for more freebies, er I mean, info. That was when Little Miss spotted the balloons and stuffed dogs. Of course, she got her pink balloon, George a blue one, and both a dog. Daddy looks good carrying a pink balloon!


Next demo - LOL... had to pause for yet another chuckle. REMC is having a power line safety demo. About halfway through, the lights quit working and they had little to no power... LOL... in true REMC fashion. Seeing how we had 25hrs with no electric AFTER the storms were over last week, Mr. Wizard and I had to laugh. They proved themselves to be top notch this day.


K-9 demo next... what a good dog. I bet they had us all sitting so far back so the dog chose the boxes and not some of the citizens of this fine county. P.A. announcement, there will be a SWAT demo in five minutes. This demo will have use of flash bombs for those with small children. You know, they maybe should have told us WHEN it would happen in the demo so you can steady your camera on the right car! I jumped, I did, practically missed the rest of it. Miss didn't like it and was short of crying... dang it, I knew better.


Hey, line for Child IDs is lower (ran all of them off with the flash bomb!) I practically ran to get in line. While standing there, I saw one of George's good friends. I took him over so he could see him, little boys are so cute when they have spent a whole 2 weeks away from each other! Back in line, line moving slow, I reach for my phone. OH NO! No I didn't! Great! I am in a panic, line isn't moving, I head back to the van leaving the crew in line. Thank goodness, I had left it in there. I recently gave up my Palm Treo to use my RAZR... that thing is too darn small!


I came back, phone in hand and there is another announcement. The State Police helicopter was going to be leaving soon. We knew we needed to tie down small children and hold our hats. So we grab the balloons, George holds his hat on, Mr. Wizard somehow manages a balloon, his hat and Little Miss's hat. 'Copter takes off and Miss I. is taking it all in. Best part of the day for her I think!


Child IDs in hand, it's time to head home. I needed to empty out the van and go upstairs for the quick packing job. Mr. Wizard needed to spray our weeds since we actually had no wind! 3 hours later... van is packed, weeds are choking, and Mr. W is cleaned up. Floodwaters here we come.

To be continued....

Product rave: Depends Adult Briefs
For those times when flash bombs are going off unexpectedly.

No, OK seriously... home fire extinguishers


If you don't have one, get one. Keep one in your kitchen, keep one by a fireplace, and if you have a workshop or anything else where a spark can land... have one handy. They are relatively inexpensive and there is no reason to not have one.

No comments: