• So I'm taking my parents home from the airport, and they're talking to each other.  I don't know what exactly, but I heard something about, "Well, we need to go to The Store tomorrow," followed by, "Do we?" and then I heard, "Well, when is the 3rd, this Sunday?"  You know, I thought for some time that The Store was already closed, but now they're saying they're closed closed as of Sunday?  They didn't have much of a reason to go back to The Store after taking an eight-day vacation, but does that mean that they're not going back to The Store ... ever?
• I woke up at 11:30.  I was hoping that I could take public transportation to the Mall of America and finally see that Princess Diana exhibit before it leaves on the 10th.  But then I hear a sink running.  Shit -- my parents are still home.  My Father wanted to go to the doctor this afternoon because of a swollen right big toe, and so I didn't understand all this talk about going to The Store; why go instead of just cooling your heels at home and go to the doctor's from home?  Still, I wanted them to go to The Store because it's so awkward for them to be here, you know?  But they didn't immediately bolt out the door; instead, they went upstairs to eat.  I wanted to wait them out in case they were just rolling out slowly, but around 12:30 I couldn't take it anymore.
• No bitching, thank God.  After washing up I went outside to eat gruel.  And then Mother asked for my help to remove some plants tomorrow.  And then Father wanted me to get a birthday cake for Mother.  Today is her birthday, and I totally forgot.  At least I had an excuse to go to MOA.  (By the way, the exhibit wasn't bad.  It isn't just Diana's dresses that are on display, although seeing the 25-foot-long train of her wedding dress is flippin' crazy.  There are pieces representing all segments of her life, such as a looping video of home videos of her as a kid.  The most intriguing piece of the exhibit is a copy of the first draft of a statement made at her funeral by her brother, Charles.  A paragraph excoriating the paparazzi that hounded her throughout her life [and, let's be real, killed her in that tunnel in Paris on August 31, 1997] was omitted from the official statement.)  Got home at 6.  Father wasn't talking down to me, nor was he talking at all, because he didn't have much of an appetite after the doctor examined his ... foot, for some reason.