We are in Ruidoso enjoying the coolness of the mountains for a little vacation before school starts, and we are staying at these little condos. Well, the kids met some other kids on the playground the first night, and it has been wonderful! It is amazing to me the camaraderie that kids instantly have. They were all on the playground, and I was sitting on a picnic table nearby to keep an eye on them, and their dad was watching to. At first, everybody was swinging or doing other things, and then Sam says, "Okay! Who wants to do an obstacle course?"
Nobody answers him, but this does not deter him. He just asks each person individually, "Do YOU want to play? Do YOU want to play?" etc.
This was a little surprising to me because I really don't see Sam as a leader, but clearly he was comfortable in this roll. He got everyone rounded up and then set out the course for everyone to follow. That was all it took, and now they are all fast friends.
Scott & Ashley show up at our condo first thing in the morning and ask if they are ready to go swimming, or they come over and watch a movie, or they play in the playground together, or play each other's video games, etc. It really has been nice because the pressure is off us to entertain them every minute of the day - they can always go check on Scott & Ashley.

You know that camaraderie I mentioned with kids? Well, it doesn't always happen with adults so easily. Last night Scott came down and asked if we wanted to go out to eat with them. We decided it would be a good idea since our kids have been hanging out together so much. So we all went to a mexican restaurant to eat.

Well, we got seated quickly and the mom immediately asks them to bring out some of the hottest salsa they have. "Bring out 3 or 4 bowls of it!" she says.
The waiter does that, and they taste them, and proclaim loudly, "This isn't hot! And it is too salty! It isn't even fit to eat! Tell your chefs to make us something HOT! Throw some fresh green chiles in there."

The waiter is a sweet young guy with a nice smile, and he says that everything is prepped ahead of time, "We've got 4 Mexican cooks in there - no chefs! And they barely understand English - I think this is the best you're gonna get."
"This is a mexican food place that doesn't know how to make salsa?"
"I guess you're going to want me to take that off your check?"
"WHAT? You charged us for this?"
"Yes m'am. I have to charge everything that I bring out. But I'm pretty sure I can get my manager to take it off."
"Well, you do that! This isn't fit to eat!"
At this point I pretty much wanted to crawl under the table. I kept trying to smile at the waiter to let him know we weren't all like that without letting her see me smiling at him and risk setting her off in my direction.
Then, bless his heart, he had to come and tell us that they were out of the chicken strips that all the kids had ordered. He looked like he wanted to crawl out of there rather than have to come tell us that.
She flipped! "What? And you're just now telling us!" (It had been about 10 minutes since he had taken our order) I quickly get all my kids to choose something else while she is insisting that he bring her the manager.
When the manager comes, she explains that the salsa is not fit to eat, we don't have any silverware, and now they are out of chicken strips and it has been 30 minutes since we ordered, and he is just now telling us that!
I will have to admit the manager was not very nice, and it got pretty ugly, but I really couldn't tell you details because I got very busy trying to clean Joey's mouth or something like that. At one point her husband was telling her, "Down, girl!"
Finally, thanks be to God, our food came. Joey was sitting between her & Steve, and for some reason, she fixated on Joey and wanting him to take a bite of his hamburger. She kept holding his hamburger up to his mouth, and saying, "Hold this with 2 hands, take a big bite." And, I swear, Joey kept stuffing one fry after another into his mouth to avoid her and looking at me out of the corner of his eye like, "Who IS this woman?" I feel your pain, Joey, I really do.
The poor waiter came by as little as he could get by with, and we ate as quickly as we could, got to-go boxes for the kids to finish up at home, left the waiter a $10 tip and got the heck out of there!
I used to pride myself with my ability to get along with anybody, but I think I may have met my match.