Our First Independent 4th

I started the day with a patriotic run, and followed it up with some patriotic flapjacks. We ate at the Cracker Barrel, which is like a slice of Americana wrapped up in a cosy little breakfast joint. I had fresh "wild" Maine blueberry pancakes; in the last six months I have had the same thing there probably seven times. I began to wonder if they are really "wild" Maine blueberries...they have an awfully large supply of them, and Maine is not that big. They were good and I think that's what matters.
I read that red snapper is an endangered species, and yet many restaurants offer red snapper dinners...I think many are red snapper-like dinners. If whomever is eating it thinks it's red snapper and enjoys it, does it really matter? Legally I guess it does, but I would have ordered the pancakes even if they contained normal blueberries.
Next we went to BJ's warehouse...it's a costco knockoff...and asked if we could wander around and check it out before we decided if we wanted to belong. As we made our way through the first couple aisles I noted aloud that it was just like Costco and we didn't have to go through the whole store. I was quietly advised that that was precisely why we were going to enjoy it all...my wife felt like she was back home in Washington and wanted to enjoy it for a while. I went to take a whiz and even the bathroom smelled like costco; the urinal cakes are very fresh smelling. We were missing the kids. Our daughter's at the coast for the weekend and unreachable, our son is heading to Fort Vancouver for the day, which is what we did as a family many times over the years... Costco-like familiarity was nice on our first independent independence day.

Growing up is hard.