Should've written this earlier

Monday was the perfect early summer evening.

Clear skies, calm water, mild temps.

And no meetings, sports, or other conflicts.

You know what that means?

Yup - a PERFECT night for a boat ride. :-)

Unfortunately, with the high price of gas - not *our boat, but a boat nonetheless.

We went in a friend's open bow 17 ft. boat, out on the bay to a favorite local bar/restaurant with a dock.

Monday's are steak night - beer, butter garlic strip steaks. Yum. And a very nice pitcher of (I'm forgetting the name) Hop Back Amber - or something like that. It was perfect.

I had a feeling dh might call, just as I was pulling out the ground beef to make burgers for the grill. He did. But - I gladly put them away and rounded up the kids. Darling daughter was in the hot tub with a friend and number one son was at the library with a friend.

When I went to get him, I spied him sitting outside of the local pizza parlor with his friends. And I just *ruined his night by taking him to the boat and interrupting his social life. He was really ugly about it. Cuz, yeah, it's torture to go hang out on a boat.

He'll be 13 next month, and I'm all for granting him small freedoms, but he seems to think he's more independent than he has a right to be. He thinks being a teenager is some magical stage where his parents won't interfere with his life.

Hah. Fat chance.

I guess you could say it was an almost perfect evening. A sullen pre-teen put a bit of a damper on it.