June 2023

Last day of school!
What seemed a million years away when Annika started kindergarten came sooner than we could have imagined: Lukas’s last day of fifth grade, and our family’s last official day at Los Alamitos. It was Aloha Day themed as usual (we had a little trouble with that — Lukas had outgrown all his shirts from last year, and we had to scramble to find something appropriate); they had a Fifth Grade Sendoff in the morning for all the parents, and then it was a free-for-all in the afternoon. The Blade Fam went for ice cream at the Willow Glen Creamery, and that’s a wrap. Annika finished her freshman year in a blaze of academic glory and a couple of finals; released early, she said she was just glad to have it done … for about five minutes, before she started worrying about next year. Heh. 

Summer happenings
Due to the weather’s lack of cooperation, we had our first pool day on June 4, when it got all the way up to the mid-80s. Uncle Ball was back, as were the pool umbrellas, R.’s margaritas, and Annika’s lime-and-topo-chico drink — even if our view was the destroyed back of our house instead of the old deck and bar, and our sound system the Wonderboom portable speaker instead of R.’s elaborate outdoor setup. Knowing we’d want to be out of the house/garage a fair amount this summer, I had joined the Cinemark movie club (snack discounts, free ticket accumulation, stuff like that) and we saw a couple of movies at the theater: The Little Mermaid (live-action) with Ami and the kids (followed by a pool afternoon at their house), and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse as a family (which somehow managed to top the first Spider-Verse movie — it was absolutely amazing). Stupid Bowlero decided not to offer the Summer Games pass this year, so we did not roll even once. Booooooo!!!

Lukas Life
Lukas was a very busy little man this month, including: Reid’s birthday party (D&D themed, hours of gameplay) took most of a day; Lukas had his first sleepover, at Ben’s (the kind of thing that would have happened years ago, but Covid); and he spent another afternoon at Ben’s playing D&D with him and a couple of the blade fellas while I took Annika to do lap swim at AVAC (she’d stopped the Sunday class and opted to just swim a few times on her own as a guest under my membership). And finally and perhaps most excitingly, he returned for a MUCH-better experience at a week of School of Rock: The teachers actually taught this time, and he got to play three songs at the end-of-week show at the Britannia Arms! He took the important role of cowbell for Cake’s Short Skirt/Long Jacket, then absolutely killed it on drums for Sappy (Nirvana) and Cherry Lips (Garbage). We all went to that show, and were joined by Ami, Manir and Amira — it was insanely fun, and he definitely wants to do it again (he even started talking plans to make his own band!). 

SF Pride weekend
Years ago, I promised Annika I’d take her to the mother of all Pride celebrations in San Francisco — and then there were two years of covid and one of being in Hawaii at the time it was being held. This year, though, we finally did it! On the last weekend of June, she and I took the train up on Saturday (leaving R. and Lukas to discover Popeye’s fried chicken and Bruce Lee movies), had dinner at Hyde St. Seafood House, and got to bed early. The next morning, we had breakfast at the hotel, and wearing rainbow flags as capes, walked over to find a good spot along Market St. The parade itself ran over four hours — wild, fun, and full of joy. Afterward, we walked over to have a late lunch at Hog Island Oyster Co. in the Ferry Building, then strolled along the waterfront to Ghirardelli for a treat before getting an uber back to the hotel. We caught an early train in the morning and got home before 9:30 (since it was Monday and R. had to get to work — didn’t want to leave Lukas all alone, that’s no fun). We had a great time, and if the logistics work out, we might end up going again!