18 boiled eggs

Today, at the lagoon (maybe that’s how the next week’s blog posts will all start)… Anyway, today at the lagoon, I saw a family with 18 boiled eggs for snacks. I know there were 18 because they had placed them back in the carton. I’m not judging it. I respect it. As a family (the Thomases) we are boiled egg people – egg mayonnaise for padkos people. Still, even we have never boiled 18 eggs for any one day.

When Jess and I first started dating, we met up with one of my very good friends who said to Jess (I forget why it came up): “You obviously know how many eggs Lara eats”.

It was the first Jess had heard of it.

In those early days of our relationship, Jess was studying for her finals, and the stress and the nerves meant that she had lost most of her appetite. A loss of appetite has never afflicted me (my mom says that Thomases are guzzlers). In those early days, one house always wins out and in our case it was Jess’. I was buying my on-repeat ingredients of hummus, eggs, halloumi, basil but then spending so much time at Jess’ that I wasn’t eating any of it. I wasn’t eating at Jess’ either. And so, as I fell in love, I also starved and I ate a lot less eggs and so my penchant for eggs was only revealed a little later when I explained to Jess that I needed a lot more food than her.

But this story is not the story of Jess and I falling in love, this is a story about the 18-eggs-for-snacks family on the beach. A member of that same family had a bow and arrow. You’re probably imagining a toy. This was not a toy. It wasn’t a compound bow but it was as professional and hardcore as a bow can look without being a compound bow. This was a proper bow. Do I need to emphasize that more? A bow bow. There was also a pile of arrows.

Two elderly people sat in chairs watching the kids playing. Mr Bow and Arrow took advantage of the captive audience, demonstrating how best to shoot an opponent that is at very close range. It is not straightforward. Literally – he shot the arrow from behind his back into the sand.

This I judge.

Not long after this demonstration, we packed up and made our way off the beach to the car park (it bears mentioning that we didn’t leave for fear of being shot – we left because Kit got cold. Only when I reached the tar, did I remember my slops in the sand. I handed Jess the car keys so she could get Kit settled in the car and then retraced my steps. As I slid on my shoes, I heard a man say, “That’s so frustrating”.

I thought Mr Bow and Arrow was talking to someone in his egg party but then he added, “Having to come all the way back just for your slops”.

What a nice man, I thought.

(Photograph of the day is at the top. Jess with freckles; Kit recovering from lagoon life.)