So, I’m coming up for air in the midst of packing, summer camps, road trips, and keeping my dad off the crazy train whilst my mom recovers from knee replacement surgery. I feel like Atlas, and I will say after finishing the Rebel Race with DH, BBC, et al., I’ve been feeling mighty strong as of late.

A few weeks ago, I was driving my normal route from pre-school drop off back to the house when, as I rolled up to a stop sign, I spied something in front of a real estate office that hadn’t been there before.

A friggin’ mermaid.

Let me tell you, when I started this project, I thought it would carry us from June to August — of the same year!  Here it is close to two years later and these sirens keep popping up. What killed me about this mermaid or rather this particular location, was that we’d found a mermaid there on during the inaugural outing!  You can’t switch ’em up on bi-annual intervals!  We’ll never get closure!

 Granted, these are two different mermaids, but I thought we’d had this block covered.  The one from 2009 is gone.  Been gone for two years!  Now, here comes this new one (albeit on the other side of the building).  Anyway, the girls were excited.  Coever decided to wiggle it, just a little bit to demonstrate her level of excitement.

I snapped a few shots of her gyrations and when I scrolled through them, it was like watching a flipbook.  Hilarious!

Now, please understand that my griping about the preponderance of mermaids is all in good fun.  Nothing makes me smile than when I take the girls on a mystery ride and see their faces when the mermaid comes into view.

The second mermaid I found happened to be when I was slogging through an early morning run with friends.  We tried a new route, threading our way past schools, across bridges, along busy roads until finally turning into a charming neighborhood with excellent waterviews.  I had no idea this little jewel of a community was back here.  We rounded the bend of the road, huffing and puffing, when what do I see?

A mermaid.

One we hadn’t seen. One that I am almost certain isn’t on the Norfolk Mermaid Poster.  One that is missing a hand like so many others.  What’s up with that?  SN: There’s a mermaid hand-nabber out there, just breaking off hands right at the wrist. Only one, usually the right hand.  Weird.

I took the girls back there after our visit with the aforementioned mermaid. They were amazed not only at the mermaid, but the roughness of the water due to the whipping winds.  “This wind sure is strong,” Morgan remarked.

“I’m strong,” declared Coever.  The proof is in the pictures.