An avid outdoorsman and snow-boarder, our best pal Jeff would leave us a few times a year to travel to Idaho. He'd return, furry and tan, and always threatening to move there. More particularly, he was eyeing this college town out there to open a bagel shop-- this was his dream. The dream of a guy who made a good fortune in business and real estate by the age of 30. Bagels? Idaho? We nodded and listened, assured this was far from becoming a reality.

Here's the reality: he's recently left us and moved there, secured the shop space and has all the wheels in motion to open his bagel shop. He even sent us the menu. Each sandwich has been carefully and humorously named after his pal's nicknames-- Scott and I even got a mention! We can't wait to go visit him.

It got me thinking--if Scott and I did that, our menu would be unidentifiable. In an anti-shmoopsie-couple effort, our nicknames for each other are odd and, more oddly, they all sound nearly the same. We started laughing imagining a family walking in and scanning our menu:

"Hi, yeah, I think I will have the Klakoo. And, uh, how about a Kleekau for Johnny-- no, no, make that a Kleekaukau-- wait, did I say Kleekaukau?"

A few days ago, we were signing papers for the mysterious "re-fi" we just did on our little row house. Sitting with the perfect-postured, matter-of-fact lawyer, she explained the dozens of documents to us and we numbly signed away, feeling slightly feeble-brained. Like an elementry-schooler. Initial here, sign there-- oops, not there, heheh, there.

We came to some sort of affadavit with lots of blank lines to list other names we may go by. I started laughing thinking of all the nicknames. I pictured us busy at work, furiously scribbling them down, running out of lines, but drawing in our own:

Mimau
Skeez
Mamooz
etc.

..and then handing them over to her, all proud of ourselves. Heh. Shouldda.

Mom is an expert sailor. As early as I can remember, she would take me out on her old, wooden Hampton and we'd skate across the bay. We drove rusted Buicks, but sailboats were always in the mix.

Since I moved back to the area, she'd been begging to take Scott and me on a weekend trip in the sailboat they treated themselves to once my brother and I were on our own. The timing has never worked out, what with our ridiculous schedules or just the weather not permitting.

Finally, last weekend, the stars were aligned. Scott and I woke up early on Saturday morning and headed to meet mom & dad at the boat. The sun was bright, the air was crisp.

What is also true about mom is that she is a perfectionist. A straight A student, a talented book author, a maticulous hostess and sailor. This time she was even more maticulous than usual, as she had a goal: to show Scott the time of his life for his first overnight trip and have him fall in love with the sport for ever and ever. This drill was well-practiced, having converted dozens of city-friends. Everything was thought of.

I was so impressed, as we crashed over the November waves with my petite, pretty mom at the helm, smiling broadly. Dad would take over and she'd scurry down below to her small "one butt galley" kitchen and surface with delectable treats, easy to eat with one hand.

Scott had mentioned a few years ago that he'd never been to the Wye River and of course mom remembered. Charts were out, my parents were excitedly barking sailing-orders back and forth as we bounded across the bay and finally rounded Bloody Point, past the lighthouse and into the mouth of the Wye, a little tricky with shoals on either side.

We took the Wye River East--dappled only with a few historic brick plantation houses. Mainly untouched. Cattails, brilliant orange and yellow foliage and hundreds of geese--the river kept turning and we kept sailing. It may have been the most beautiful experience I've had on the Chesapeake.

Around 4:00, we found a nice inlet to drop anchor and have cocktails. Now very remote, far away from any civilization, we excitedly bundled up. The sky was full of V's of geese, the late angle of the sun electrifying the trees lining the shore. A nice breeze would occasionally blow. We exchanged recent stories and I noticed Scott growing silent.

Normally very much at ease with my parents and also a Chesapeake-lover, I couldn't understand what may have been troubling him. Another breeze-- yet this one carried with it a wierd stench. It would pass. Then, again. It smelled, well, like poop.

Dad was grilling dinner on the back of the boat, Mom was below. Poop breeze. I shot Scott a look, which he promptly responded with a nostril-flare. I shrugged my shoulders. Mom and dad would never sail with any sort of potty issues! What could it be? A few minutes later--portapotty. The sun started to sink.

We stayed in the cockpit, keeping dad company. The geese population seemed to triple-- there were now thousands of them honking at once. It was like a goose woodstock, it was a concert, loud.

The look on Scott's face at that moment was priceless. In the middle of nowhere, to be cabined up with his inlaws merely feet away all night, a mysterious fecal aroma and the cacophany of geese honking at us. "Wow, do you think geese, um, sleep?"

Dinner was scrumptious, gourmet and even was served with a miniature fall table arrangement with a candle. Plates were cleared and cleaned in the teensy little sink and we cuddled up in the cabin with blankets and continued to chat.

The apple dessert aroma was cleaned away, and It returned. Indeed, right from the potty-area, something behind that closed door. My parents had made up the V-birth all cozy for us to stay in, inches away from the "problem".

Now impossible to ignor, I went public with it. "Mom, something is wrong."

She lept to her feet and tore into the bathroom and resurfaced with a way-too-technical description about how it simply couldn't be any, um, matter, as everything had been pumped from the last sail they took and it was doublechecked before our departure.

"I only peed once," Scott promply cleared himself, which then began a very awkward "whodunnit". I was innocent. I think we all were. What could it be?

Dad's sense of smell has largely diminished, so I won the honor of acting as expert sniffer. He instructed me to snif storage spaces, lifting up parts of the floor and pointing me toward what could have been bilge-y, even a nasty fuel-soaked rag-- nothing.

Scott and I started to laugh, as we bobbed together in the dark, far away from anything, with an enigmatic repository of crap inches away. It was 7:30 and I was far from tired. Not so funny. My stomach turned.

Mom tried everything, emptied eco-friendly additives to the tank (not without one shocking "backfire" resulting in alarming shrieks), sanitizing everything, again and again. She did all she could.

They had to give up-- the pump at the dock must have been flawed and didnt actually remove the contents from their last cruise with friends, which was.. when? I didnt ask.

Scott and I chunked down a glass of wine and crawled into our cozy sleeping nook--I opened the hatch nearly all the way, even with the gooseapalooza outside and the freezing temperatures. Scott drifted right off. The beautiful concert, lovely stars and slight rocking didn't even help me. My acute sniffer just wouldn't let me down: third world. Whew.

Scott woke up at once point and shot straight up, his head nearly poking through the hatch, hair sticking straight up. Groggily, he said "If anyone ever asks me if geese sleep, I now know the answer." He chuckled, lay his head down and started breathing deeply again.

We all awoke very early and had the most exhilirating sail home ever. It was wet and wonderful. We sailed close-hauled with our Genoa taught, crashing and screaming along, the bay spraying on foul weather gear. Scott and I stayed on the high side, with our legs dangling over the side, mirroring the racing crews we passed.

Exhilirated, he praised our speed. "We'd be going a lot faster if we didn't have 8 pounds of poop on board." I responded, and he laughed heartily. I think he'll go again.

Ah, city life.

Walking our old wobbly-legged dog down our block the other morning, Scott passed a large, parked SUV. At nearly eye-level, he couldnt help but notice there were people in it, asleep. Curious, he glanced a second time to notice it was a couple, not very sightly at that, totally passed out. Her shirt was half-on, and the rest was overtly on display.