Captain Alex and the Trash Can Droid

We had to travel to Suffolk County today. The easiest way (for us) is by the Bridgeport-Port Jefferson ferry. The ride to Bridgeport was kinda long for Alex's taste, but the ferry ride was just right! He was all excited to see the ferry pull in at Bridgeport.

I headed straight for the front of the boat, which is where the lounge is. When I smoked, I used to sit here. Now, I just know that it's the best view on the whole ferry, from the inside, at least.

Alex thought so too.


We had a snack on the way. A turkey sandwich on a roll with some water.  In usual form, Alex has said he didn't want anything to eat and then proceeded to eat half of my sandwich.  Good thing I'm on a diet.

A surprisingly long time after eating and after having asked a million questions, Alex got restless.  He wanted to explore the ferry.  I took him to the rear of the boat where I know there's an outdoor part.  It was quite rainy that day.  I didn't expect him to want to be outside for long.  When he spotted the stairs to the upper deck, he asked me if we could climb them.  When we got up there, I found a huuuuuge wind, blowing us here there and everywhere, lots of wispy rain and an overjoyed Alex.

Alex wasn't too happy when I had him go back downstairs. But Alex is too little to be in such high winds for my comfort.  Besides, we were nearly at Port Jefferson.  Aunt Ellen met us at the ferry landing.  We got Alex's car seat into her car and went off to the funeral parlor.   I got Alex changed into his suit there.

 

There, he played with Codey, crawled on the floor, asked for his toys and got generally restless. He said he wanted this "grown up thing" to be over.  I hugged him and praised him for being such a good boy.  At the restaurant, he enjoyed his french fries and cake.  But he was tired and needed to get to bed. 

We went home with Tony and Donna that evening since Ellen has some..er..."challenging" dogs who aren't too crazy about kids.  We slept in the basement room adjacent to their new theater room.  

The next morning, Uncle Tony put the television on in there so that Alex could see cartoons.  I was really impressed with the theater room.  Alex was more impressed with the trash can he found there. It was a [near] life sized  R2 D2 that Tony had never used as a real trash can.   He asked Uncle Tony to bring it up from the basement.  He asked me to bring it upstairs so that their rabbit, Snowflake, could see it.  Then he asked me to bring it back down.

When Aunt Ellen arrived to bring us to the petting zoo, I had to move the car seat from Tony's car to Ellen's.  I asked Alex to stay in the house while I moved it and he went ballistic! He feared we were going to the petting zoo without him.  He apparently got his own boots on and managed to pick up the trash can and get it out the door.   It wasn't a fun scene when I had to tell him that the R2 wasn't coming with us.  (It had been a gift from one of the boys.)  I promised Alex that I would order him one.

Postscript: I should have made sure about what I found online before I made that promise.  What I found online for 73 dollars was a 10 inch desktop trash can.  The nearly 3 foot high one is now a collector's item worth approx. 250-300 dollars.  I found one on eBay with no minimum bid.  I put in a bid for 75 dollars.  I was outbid by nearly 200.  It sold for about 269 dollars.

With that, I had to explain to Alex that no R2 trash can would be arriving.  He took the news better than I expected.  Maybe that was because we had such a great time at the petting zoo.