Slippery when wet, grippery when dry

 On a promise today to visit the Canoe Lake water splashpark with Mr Ben for slippery fun. One day, when I'm rich and famous, I'll take all the Piddlers to the best waterpark in the world (Schlitterbahn, New Braunfels, Texas). They give away tickets on the morning show of 92.1FM KNBT just for ringing up and telling the audience what you did on the weekend - I'd be sure to win as I'm more interesting than "Oh, we just hung out in the back garden and had a BBQ" but then there's the slight issue of the 40-hour return commute and the £963 aeroplane tickets. I might just stick to cycling down to the seafront.

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You'll never see a church offering free wi-fi. They can't compete with an invisible power that actually works....

So. The first week of the summer hols has passed and now it's Jof week. Ben and I led the way with heads held high (as far as is reasonably possible when you're only 3 foot) and met the first error of the day.

The watery splashpark was dry. Sand and flakes of skin gathered in wind-blown dunes where there should have been fountains and squirtles and geysers and bubblers and stuff. But this was ameliorated by the arrival of Puddlers Elizabeth and the JoniBobs and a giant beach ball, so we played football instead in the highly suitable Dry Gulch Canyon with its added obstacle course and non-slip flooring. I had a go on the caterpillar (soft play inflatable obstacle course) and Bobert got feisty. In addition there is the perennial task of excavating the mysterious old mound (suspected megalithic round barrow) for treasure and antique artefacts.
When the park was built, the men with diggers spent a long time burying a concrete drain pipe section to make a train tunnel and roosting place for mosquitoes. Our job, as we see it, is to dig it up again. In our 4-hour play session we also hit the swingpark and the sandpit, where we discovered we could fill my socks with sand and swing them around as coshes. Once we'd been told off I de-sanded them and put them back on. Expect a sandy shower tonight. We are also qualified Ice Cream Detectives and can smell a freezer from 300 yards away due to microscopic traces of leaked CFC's, much like a shark detecting blood.
Afterwards Ben came back to mine for extended Lego play, always a winner. Bud had been to 7 shops to try and get bath fizzers, and came back with a bouncy Darth Vader toy for Ben. You've gotta wonder whose kid is more important here....