Tod and Buzz in the bath

Blogger's Note - Okay, this blog post should be a two parter, but bear with me here and if you need to, read it over a two-day period to lessen the eyestrain and avoid the brain hurt.

The original plan was to have the upstairs bathroom be for the girl's to share and for the ground floor bathroom to become the domain of the adults.

As we have almost (finally) completed the 2nd level interior renovations (Stairway, 2 bedrooms, 1 office, 1 playroom, 2 hallways, 3 walk-in closets, 2 secret hiding cubbie holes, and one huge bathroom complete with two sinks, two-station make-up vanity, walk-in closet, 9-drawers, 12 cabinet doors, and a clawfoot tub) we're looking to bogart the downstairs bathroom as our own.

We celebrated by installing a new, taller 17" ADA height commode (which would have been a bit of a jump for our littlest to use on a daily basis) into OUR bathroom, while moving the standard 14.5" one into the girl's bathroom.

Their themed, brightly hued, and somewhat mismatched towels and bath supplies are upstairs; our soothing and natural matching earth toned linens now occupy OUR bath linen closet.

Little Ponies, Mermaid Barbies, Watermelon scented no-tears shampoo, Lego jetski playset, suitcases brimming with hair bobs, hair beads, hair braids, hair clips, and hair bobbles, - all upstairs.

Bath and Body works skin scrubs, Mediterranean sea sponge loofah, Arbonne hair products, and oatmeal impregnated bar soaps - downstairs.

Yep, it's good to have our own bathroom.

The only complaints have been easily rectified...so far.

First, in the hectic morning rush hour traffic that is our house, there are times when making the girls run upstairs to brush their teeth is problematic and downright cruel.
Solution - get duplicate toothbrushes for the downstairs bathroom.

Second, the sheer size and number of mirrors we installed in the upstairs bathroom was giving C the willies due to her unfortunate slumber party exposure to the legend of Bloody Mary.
Solution - I sat in the darkened bathroom with her one night, went through the whole Bloody Mary procedure and proved to her there was no such thing as Bloody Mary...well, at least one that didn't involve tomato juice and vodka.

Third, there isn't a flatscreen tv in the upstairs bathroom
Solution - uh, sorry girls, we didn't plan on installing one there. Tough luck.

Now, don't go all "that's such a guy thing, having a tv in the bathroom" on me. It was my Wife's idea. See, we watch so little tv as it is, that the only time my Wife figured she'd have the uninterrupted time to view a little of the tube, is while she bathed. The LCD models are so compact and streamline, that finding the space in the linen closet was a no brainer and when hooked up to a dvd player, bath time becomes movie time as well.

Which brings me somewhat circuitously to Tod and Buzz in the bath.

Awhile back I must have been waxing poetic about our families travels on Route 66, prompting my Mom to send me the dvd collection of the first season of the 60's tv show of the same name.

Having been born a few years after the premier of the famous tv show about two guys seeing the country from the bucket seats of a classic (then and now) Corvette, I had never seen one full episode in the comfort of my home tv. Unlike Gilligan's Island, Route 66 didn't seem all that popular with the syndicated station guys, as reruns were hard to come by.

They dvds came in a lovely boxed set, and had I been a single guy, with single guy values, single guy time, and single guy space, I would have run down to the quickie mart, bought a couple dozen diet cokes in glass bottles, some string cheese (don't ask) and a pounder bag of teriyaki beef jerky, plopped myself down in front of the tube and watched every episode of my new prized dvd collection in order.

Instead, over the last few weeks, I've had the pleasure of discovering the sheer pleasure of Route 66: The Series from the comfort and late night solitude of OUR downstairs bathroom. The roughly 46-minute episodes are broken up into 3 distinct acts, which, when split into 15-20 minute soak sessions, allows me to stretch my virgin viewings of these video gems from the past into manageable and concentrated sessions.

I had no idea of the dramatic depth and exceptional screenwriting offered by this vintage series, not to mention what sheer joy it was to see familiar locations (in and around LA) as they existed around the time of my worldly conception.

Seeing the UCLA campus that my Mom and Aunt attended in their younger days was a hoot. And the boarding house where the boys live while passing through LA looked to me to be what is now Yamashiro's restaurant in the hills above Hollywood.

The series pilot is as spooky an introduction to a tv show as I've ever seen, and having passed through many a dinky and dying town here in Oklahoma where you can feel the eyes of the downtown residents watching you drive by from behind their shuttered windows, I got the genuine creeps as Buzz and Tod fell into the hands of some nutjob local townies.

While my prospects of spending a few months traveling the Mother Road in a ragtop Vette with my best bud at my side are far behind me, I can't imagine it being anymore fun than my recent sojourns up and down Oklahoma's offering of Rt. 66 with my lovely wife and our two road trip loving girl's.

As for Tod and Buzz, well, we'll always have my bathroom and Kingman...Barstow...San Bernardino, right?