Ryan and I were talking about why we chose to live in San Diego again.  He said he would live here even if there wasn’t an ocean a few miles away.  I agreed, as long as the weather was the same, but said I still probably held the beach in my top 3 reasons for liking Southern California.

We went to the beach again today and I may have to change my answer to saying if San Diego didn’t have an ocean, I may not want to live here.  I could lay on the beach forever if the temperature is right.  And honestly, unless the weather is ideal, I don’t go to the beach anyway.

Here are my favorite things about the beach, in no particular order:

• People watching – it rivals any DMV.  The beach welcomes all kinds of people and for that, I am thankful.  Things have settled down quite a bit since they outlawed any alcohol on the beach and some beaches are much more geared towards families, but there is always something to look at.
• The sound of the waves – if I could afford to live on a beach front property, I would do it in a heartbeat.  I would sleep like a baby hearing that rhythmic crashing of water on the beach.
• Critters – today we found a little crab running around.  The kids loved it!  It’s also not unusual to see dolphins swimming and leaping out of the water just off the coast.  It’s a surreal sight.  Catching sand crabs is also a happy pastime – they look like little bugs.
• Salty lips – the sea breeze covers you in salt water and I love licking my lips and tasting the salty film.  This is one of the things Kamryn hates about the beach.  It makes her gag.  Which makes me like it even more because it’s funny watching her lick her lips, gag, lick her lips again, gag.
• Free pedicures – my heels are always softer from walking in the sand.
• Playing with friends – there is something about the mixture of sand and water that keeps kids occupied for hours and hours and hours.  That leaves a lot of open time for moms to sit back and relax.

Now for the things I don’t really like about the beach.

• Sand.
• Sand.
• Sand.
• Sand.

I will literally be washing sand out of Rory’s ears for the next 2 days.  Kamryn seems to always get it in her nether regions and I always feel like it is stuck in my hair and scalp until I get two good washes in.  I had to tap my phone on the arm of the chair to get all the sand out of the crevices and ports so I could plug it in to charge it.  That shit is everywhere!