I took my boys there (ages 6 mo and 2.5 at the time) on a vacation to the Oregon Coast. I'm sitting in the kid's book section trying to find a good book with my older kid about the ocean, because he won't see it again for another year and I figure he needs something to remember it by. Well, this granola hippie chick is wandering by, and she stops and says, "Oh man, that's just so AWESOME. You are one great dad! I wish my dad had been there for me like that! Blah blah blah."
My first thought is, "This chick has some fantastic breasts."
My second thought is, "Stop that. You're married and have two kids."
My third thought is, "Keep talking." Who doesn't like being told they are AWESOME?
She just keeps on going about what a stud I am as a daddy, and then she just stops and looks up. "Is there a leaking pipe in here?" she says.
And my heart sinks. My son is sitting among a pile of books I haven't yet bought, and it's formed an island because there's a pool of urine all around him. We'd just started potty training him a few weeks earlier, and he forgot to warn me in all the excitement.
I grab the urine-soaked books and the drenched little boy, and run to find a bathroom three flights up in that goddamn maze of a place. And of course there was a five minute wait in line to pay for the books.
This year I think we skip Powells.