More Rain.

Yeah, more rain, and my solar batteries were already run down. However, silver linings and all that, so I tried to stay positive and focus on good things. So it was with a great deal of amusement that I watched a young mom and her two small children walk from the parking lot to the hobby store - both tots carrying open umbrellas with glee.

I remember that gleeful feeling myself. The need for an umbrella was a rarity in my northern Montana childhood - not that rain was so rare, necessarily, but liquid precipitation that wasn't driven by gale force umbrella-inverting winds was kind of elusive. So my eight year old self getting to walk outside with my blue-grey paisley umbrella that matched my blue-grey raincoat was quite a thrill. And to be honest, it's a thrill that I still feel every time I'm under a canopy of silk with the patter of raindrops beating a gentle cadence over my head. ::sigh:: Oh the romance!

All of these thoughts flitted through my mind as I drove past; the little boy especially made me smile with his bright yellow SpongeBob parasol, perched at an inefficient but adorable angle allowing him to focus more on it than his trajectory. I was amused all the way to the edge of the parking lot, when it suddenly occurred to me that if I were to unfurl my own umbrella, it would probably entertain a lot more people than some middle aged woman in a green Honda Element.

Y'know, what with it being a giant LADYBUG, and all...