It took Monday to decompress from my Saturday and Sunday. Not that my weekend wasn't good, it just entailed a lot of running around. I felt as though I was permanently attached to my car at one point...but as long as taking my little guy to the pool and to his first baseball game of the season (not to mention taking li'l ol' me to a Geek Dinner, 'cause if Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy) made him a happy camper, it was all worth it.

Since our swine flu stay-at-home time, we've been heading to the swimming pool a great deal. And not just any pool...my son prefers the pool he learned how to swim in for the past few summers, to the point where he refuses to swim in other pools I take him to. Granted, I can understand the pool preference thing, as there are some swimming pools I've seen that have seriously creeped me out, and he is still a novice swimmer, but I hope he gets comfortable swimming in more than one pool, and soon. It gets crazy having to schlep the kid out to Metairie all the time.

Seeing the kid swim, however, makes me realize how spoiled I was when I was learning how to swim. I had access to pools that weren't too shallow or too deep, so I could practice moving about in the water without freaking out about whether or not I could touch the bottom of the pool if I had trouble doggy-paddling. My son is learning in pools with shallow ends at 3 to 3 1/2 feet deep, and he spent a couple of summers hanging out on the steps that bring the kids down to that level, since he was too short to be confident that the water wouldn't be over his head when he tried to stand on the pool floor.

Where does that leave us, then? Picture a bizarre, quasi-comedic ritual of having this child continually jump in the pool not far from those same steps he spent so much time on these past few summers, dog-paddle or kick over to those steps, climb out, and jump in again, yelling things like "Keep your legs straight when you hit the water!" in a British accent, while I repeatedly try to give him tips such as "Paddle with your arms in front of your head, honey, not off to the sides of your body," and am repeatedly ignored on that count. Thankfully, I am not ignored when the kid gets more confident and decides to jump into the pool at a distance further away from the steps but still close to the wall of the pool: "Kiddo, you're getting tired, I can tell. Swim to the wall when you get tired,"I say, and, wonder of wonders, he does what I say and the lifeguard breathes a sigh of relief.

And, in this way, the little guy's swimming slowly improves.

Slowly.

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So glad to have been able to attend my first Geek Dinner in a long while, and to have dragged lunanola and Net2NO's Jessica Rohloff into the mix over there Saturday night! Just wish I could have stayed longer, but the little guy was tanking from a full day himself, even though he outlasted Dangerblond in her own house, no less. It was good to see Racymind again and see she was doing well, but boy, did I miss Sophmom. Please get well soon, madame!

Also, a hearty mazel tov to Clay and Candice on their engagement (They met at Geek Dinner III - a match made through NOLA blogging circles!), and to Pistolette on the birth of her second child.