“Where am I going?” Danlee asks.
I direct her to the park everyone calls the Duck Pond not far from here. There are several things we can knock out if we can find an open grassy area.
She pulls into the parking lot next to the park and we jump out.
Skimming the list again, I say, “Okay, let’s start with Duck, Duck, Goose!”
Mason will video and Judd has volunteered to be the one to start the game, so Archer, Danlee, and I sit in a tight circle on the grass.
Judd walks very slowly around us, patting us each on the head as he says, “Duck.”
“You know this isn’t a real game,” Archer says. “Saygoosealready.”
But Judd is Judd and the game continues. Finally he pats me on the head and yells, “Goose!”
I jump up, ready to tag him and move on to the next item, but he is running for his life. Finally, Danlee grabs his leg when he passes her and holds him for me so I can tag him.
Another team arrives and I see Charlie and Mary Jo were both picked for the red team. We are never going to hear the end of this.
We knock out the handstand task and the slide one quickly, then look for a willing stranger to dance in front of.
“I’ve got this one!” Judd says.
He picks this mom who’s pushing her little girl in a stroller. But Charlie runs up to her at the same time.
Charlie and Judd lean in and talk to her for a second and she nods, agreeing to whatever they’ve just asked her. She clearly doesn’t know them.
Judd pulls out his phone and we hear music playing. Oh my God, it’s “SexyBack” by Justin Timberlake. And they are both dancing to it. In front of this poor mother.
Again, this challenge needed about ten seconds of dancing and then her score, but Judd and Charlie are in a full-on dance-off.
The red team is on one side and we’re on the other, each cheering for our teammate. Charlie is the clear winner, but I stay loyal to the greens. Even when Judd’s on his third round of the Sprinkler.
Now the little girl is dancing in her stroller and clapping for the guys. The dance-off is being filmed by both sides and I can imagine the moms laughing when it’s uploaded.
This song is longer than I remember.
I think Charlie and Judd agree, because they finally call it quits about halfway through. Both are gasping for breath.
The mom claps for both, then leans down to chat with her daughter, who can’t be older than three.
“Who was the best one?” she asks the little girl.
The girl’s eyes get big and her gaze bounces from one boy to the other. She finally points to Charlie and yells, “Him! Him! He rolled on the ground!”
The red team cheers and everyone is hugging everyone else until it’s Mary Jo and Charlie’s turn. They don’t hug but they do high-five, which is REMARKABLE for them.
We run through several more tasks that can be done at this park, including Danlee and me challenging two middle schoolers to a three-legged race. Mary Jo and her teammate Destiny join in, but Danlee and I smoke them and it feels good.
By the time we’ve left the park, we’ve got almost half of the list done, but we’ve also burned up about half of our time.
We head to one of the busier streets to find a restaurant for the “doing the dishes” and “eating with a family” challenges. Judd and Archer head inside with Danlee and Mason so they can film it. I stay behind, outside the building, and try Leo one more time.
He finally answers on the fourth ring.
“Yeah?” he says, his voice flat.
“Oh my God, are you okay? I’ve been worried to death! I thought you were coming to this party!”
