DH, our two daughters, and I ventured to Rapids on the Reservoir (local water park) last Friday per dd(10)’s request.  Here’s what I learned:

* What goes up must come down either by the stairs or the slide.

* There are exactly 77 steps from the ground to the top of “Raging Waters”.

* Children don’t accept “I’m afraid of heights” as a legitimate explanation for not going down by the slide.  (Neither does a husband.)

* The velocity at which a body moves down the Raging Waters slide is in direct proportion to body mass.

* Sunscreen works but only where it’s applied.

* If it’s hot enough to go to the water park, it’s hot enough to convert Blistex from a solid to a liquid state.

* Once Blistex converts into a liquid, it is never quite the same again.

* It’s humanly impossible for a dad to resist the urge to dump his children off a raft.

* It’s humanly impossible for a husband to resist the urge to dump his wife off a raft.

* The amount of energy reserves an individual has decreases exponentially each year of life so that a ten year old has a considerably greater reserve than someone, let’s say, that is forty-one.

* The extreme fun had by said forty-one year old at the water park with her family greatly exceeds any fear of heights, sunburn, depleted energy reserves, mouthfuls of water, and melted Blistex.