It's a rude world outside these prison walls

Warden's orders are that the Guard and #2 and #3 need haircuts. Go. Now. 

Arrive at usual place. Our clan is closely followed out of parking lot by a 'to-be' rival prison group. Guard holds door for prisoners and rival clan pushes past us in our moment of kindness and rushes to counter to get in line first, putting in the names of her and all her 4 snot nosed prisoners ahead of us. Our reward? An hour wait. We leave before Guard becomes leading story on the 6 o'clock news. 

Go to next place. Packed. Another 60 minute wait. Nope. 

Third place?  Empty!  Score. Until we stood at counter for 5 minutes, finally leaving when Guard over hears one of the 'stylists' state that she wished it was closing time because she hates cutting kids hair. No problem, we hate you too. Buh-bye. 

Now we are at the fourth place. 5, then 6 then 7 minutes with no one greeting us (and they are not busy either), and now we are in search of our next stop. 

Fifth place will surely be our salvation. We are greeted immediately and told there is 'at most' a 20 minute wait. Awesome right?  42 minutes later with no end in sight and the prisoners (who were surprisingly really really good) start to complain of hunger. And they are correct, it is past chow time. So we leave. 

Five strikes and we are out. No hair cuts and one very frustrated Guard who has exceeded his patience quota for rude and nasty people. Back to the sanctity of our prison. Hair cuts will come another day. 

Maybe this is our answer:

Summer is over. Back to the grind.

Summer is over at the prison. 1&2 boarded the bus this morning and were shipped of to vocational training, otherwise known as 1st grade. 3 moved up to pre K in anticipation of her becoming old enough to attend vocational school next year. 

Here are the neighborhood prisoners loading up for training, being sent off by some of the younger prisoners. 

It has been a long and busy summer, evidenced by the Guard's lack of time to chronicle their adventures. 

In typical GP (Garfield Prision) fashion, procrastination levels are always high. School shopping was squeezed into the last two days before school. But in equally typical GP fashion, the prisoners arrived at their send off point on time, well dressed and with proper supplies. 

The summer was a blur. 1&2 spent a week with their GREAT Aunt and Uncle in Virginia and 3 spent a week shuffled between her Aunt and Grandmother (we are forever in debt to you all!!). The Warden enjoyed a week vacation while the Guard spent time at a conference in San Diego. All told, it was a fun time away from GP for all. 

The summer also included some time spent with friends from Florida who came to visit, and with a buddy from Ohio who stayed with us for a long weekend. Sprinkle in trips to the granparent's pool and the daily attendance of summer camp and the prisoners had a pretty solid summer. 

There have been a ton of stories that would have played well in this space, but old age and the pressures of the day job and as Guard have led those stories to fade into oblivion. I do have one story that I find funny, but in 10 years, I doubt the prisoner will be happy.  So here goes. 

#1 is our nervous thinker. She thinks about everything and worries more than the other prisoners. Starting the new school year has provided a high stress level for her over the past few weeks. #1 has a, um, delicate digestive system. We have battled her system that results in, um, clogged plumbing. The summer was carefree and her plumbing worked well, until about a week ago. Plumbing backed up, and the process to clean it out takes some time. We were really close to being on the good side of the problem with everything working properly to avoid any potential first day issues. Until #1 started to worry about the first day of school. The worry started early in the day but really hit it's apex while she prepared for bed. Her tummy hurt. She powered through and fell asleep. At 2 am, #1 was at my bedside. She was nervous, couldn't sleep and her tummy hurt. She crawled into bed and almost instantaneously fell asleep. Well, not completely asleep. Her digestive system went into over drive. How a pretty little girl like her can create what she created is beyond comprehension. The smells.... Oh.my.gawd.  It woke the dead (me!). It curled my hair and watered my eyes. Didn't seem to phase the Warden, but I also acted as a large mountain separating the Prisoner and Warden. All I can say is wow. WOW!  Anyway, I love her. I did tell her about it in the morning, and she was not only not embarassed, but thought it was hilarious and told the other prisoners about it. Yeah, life with young prisoners and potty humor. 

Anyway, now that the prisoners are safely stowed away for the training year, I will try to get back in the habit of providing timely status reports.