An Olympic Gymnast, a Card Shark and a Gunslinger Walk into a Bar…

J. has left me an encouraging message. “Deep breaths, my baby. I’ll be back in two days.”

While the kids go off to take a closer look at their new stuff, I pour a glass of wine, light the grill and call my sister. Mostly for encouragement but also to explain upfront and before she discovers it herself, that I am not the one to have cracked the seal on the Bombay Sapphire or the Jack Daniels Single Barrel and left both with about a shot glass full in the tank (the more expensive equivalent of putting the ice cube tray back into the freezer with one cube left).

She is on vacation too, with folks who are evidently a lot more fun than my vacation companions. She relates to me that last night, out to dinner with her husband and some friends, she was persuaded to order a chocolate martini for dessert. And at somepoint shortly thereafter, my sister executed a perfect yet impromptu Olympic competition caliber, medal round quality, high degree of difficulty dismount from the surface of her bar stool – the martini glass flying end over end toward another table where it was picked off by a fellow patron in a grab that would make Shane Victorino proud. And while she took flight, her brand new wide brimmed hat sprang from her head and landed on the floor in such a way that it caught said martini, the contents now being separated from the glass, artfully and neatly in its hollow. Tens all around.

Our dinner table scene would be equally bizarre but far less entertaining.

First up – Poker! My son, in some recently suggested small sums math exercise, learned the principles of Black Jack. Estelle and Bill, casino veterans, finally have some genuine common ground with my son and decide to further advance his knowledge of the game by sharing their infinite knowledge of counting, dealing, casino tricks of the trade and a few colorful stories about their casino-going escapades.

More chardonnay, please.

And then following one dimly-lit, alcohol-soaked casino thought to the next and the next and the next, the thread eventually leads to organized crime and then to criminal activity. Bill suddenly turns dramatically to my mother and slurs in a whisper loud enough for Mrs. Harris to hear even with her new happy hour earplugs in,

“We are going to have to remember to lock the glove compartment.”

My mother, realizing that the statement is too cryptic to be completely and clearly understood by my minor children, and wanting to be sure that I got the point, feels compelled to joyfully and proudly clarify with a cheerful explanation:

“Bill and I got rid of the taser and bought a gun.”