Remember the time we tied Jake's leash to Ryan's stroller?

I don't know what it was about children being inside the house that so annoyed our Dad.
When we were at my Dad's house for the weekend, if you were caught loitering about the premises for more than 5 minutes my Dad was right there like he was breaking up a high school party...
"all right people lets go, take it outside..."
Can't a kid just hang out?!
Or, as my sister says,
"I just wanted to watch Gilligan's Island"
Whatever. We were exiled.
"Get out of my house! You, your sister, Waz...and while you're at it take the Goddamn dogs!"
So there we are, a ragged band, like the Jews wandering the desert, like the homesteaders trekking across the Great Plains in Conestoga wagons...

Too dramatic? Sorry.

It's me, Waz in a stroller, Jake and Angie on leashes and my sister.
I don't know where the decision making process broke down. I don't know why I didn't just take the dogs, and she took the stroller.
I just know that at some point it seemed like a keen idea to tie a leash connected to a 150 pound rottweiler to the stroller that my brother was strapped into.

(Hey! I was 12! I was not ready to command this kind of expedition, ok?)

So...Jake sees another dog whose ass he would love to give a neighborly sniff and he heads off in that direction.

Abruptly.
With vigor.

The stroller is Yanked out of my hands and Waz goes off on Mr. Toads Wild Ride.
He is flying down the sidewalk. I was a very fast runner, but they were away from me before I could squeak about it.

He gets about 3 house lengths ahead of me, he is almost to his new friend...and just as I have the thought "cool he's going to stop..."
(can i just ask, why is it always the case that just as you think "it's ok, disaster has been averted"...the shit hits the fan?)

Just as I think it's cool?

The stroller hit a crack in the sidewalk.
The stroller launched 4 feet into the air.
The stroller inverted itself mid-air.
The stroller landed kid-side down.
The stroller slid across the length of the lawn.
The stroller stopped.
Jake got a nose-full of ass.

I catch up and flip the stroller over and I can tell by the look on Waz's face he will never be the same.
Stunned?
sure.
Bloody?
Only a little.
But you know what?
The man flies helicopters now!
And he just might have the stomach for it because of that ride. Maybe after that he realized nothing would ever be scarier?
Who knows. ( I also convinced him to sit in the front car of various roller coasters and water-flumes with me, much to his terror/benefit)

So. I bend the stroller back into an approximation of what it once was and we head back to the house
(even though I know we aren't welcome. It's like trying to get into studio 54 circa 1979.)

The rest is hazy. I know there was a lot of punishment. I don't remember if my sister ratted me out, if Waz started crying the second we got back or if the frame damage on the stroller outed me.

I just know there was punishment aplenty.
and if I say "remember when we tied Jake to Ryan's stroller" I can make my sister laugh.