We spend a lot of time at the pool. I'm starting to think there are mathematical rules and theorems that govern our experience there. Here's what I mean:
The Preparation to Pool Time Proportion: The amount of time it takes you to get your family ready to go to the pool (finding suits and towels, changing children, packing snacks, filling water bottles, locating the one lost flip flop) is inversely proportional to how long you will be at the pool before the first child asks if they can go home.
The 80 Minute Sunscreen Phenomenon: The more diligently you apply sunscreen every 80 minutes to your children, the greater the risk that the only part of your own body that will receive similar attention will be the palms of your hands. Or possibly your eyeballs when you forget that your hands are covered in sunscreen and you rub your eyes.
The OH GOD DID YOU JUST SAY THAT Census: If you ask your happily swimming child if they need to use the bathroom and they respond with: "Not anymore", there is a 100% certainty that everyone at the pool will hear it. As a result, there is a directly proportional increase in the number of people who think you're gross.
The Mermaid Hair Summation: There is a correlative relationship between the number of hours spent at the pool in a given week with how ratted out your daughters' will be and the amount of time that will be required to ameliorate the damage.
The God Damn Ice Cream Truck Equation: The likelihood that the ice cream truck will show up in the first five minutes you're at the pool is increased exponentially if you have left your wallet at home.
The Law of Goggle Probability: There will be 43 pairs of goggles in the lost and found, but none of them will be the ones your child is crying over.
The Ratio of Turdish Behavior to Parental Inattention: If a child is at the pool behaving in such a manner as to call into question whether the child is a possible human/demon hybrid, there is a high level of confidence that said hybrid's parents are playing Candy Crush on their phone*.
*Please be relieved to note that I no longer play Candy Crush on my phone.
The Multiplicative Interaction of Heat and Pee Stink: There's a dynamic relationship between ambient heat, humidity, and the stench of the pool's public bathroom. For every degree over 90 degrees Fahrenheit (multiplied by humidity), there is a 10-20% increase in bathroom smelliness in terms of depth, intensity, and ability to spread out across the pool deck like a dense fog of stink. Also applies to the diaper-filled trashcan by the baby pool.
The Round-Trip Transaction Confounder: The only thing that is more frustrating than getting small children and all of their stuff to the pool, is the prospect of the reverse transaction when they are hot, damp, and tired.
The Probability of iPhone Wetness: If your child reaches into your pool bag and/or purse for something while at the pool, there are two certainties upon which you can depend: (1) That child's hand will be soaking wet and (2) your cell phone will be the first thing they touch.
The NOOOOOO!!!! Algorithm: The universal parental response to the one child who always thinks they can swim WHEN THEY CANNOT SWIM who toddles around the edge of the pool trying to leap into the deep end during the one second their mom looks away.
The Theory of Preferential Darkness: The concept that swimming at night is waaaaaaayyy more fun than swimming during the day.
The Remainder Theorem: This is not a hypothesis. You will lose something or leave something behind. You might not realize that you have done so until it is too late to retrieve it.
The Prime Directive: For every hour a child spends at the pool playing in the sun, splashing, getting physical activity, and improving their socialization through play, there is an excellent chance that they will wear themselves out to the point that an early bedtime is a real possibility.
((c) Mommyland Blogs 2013-2014
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