for our favorite brother

In a mere 35 days the one and only Melvin will be arriving here in The Islands. He is of course bringing my mom with him and Roger and I are very excited. We can't wait to show them the sights of our city (like floods, polluted waterways, rats the size of small dogs) and we can't wait to introduce our city to the McClure family.

In preparation for their arrival we have been cleaning out the guest bedroom, planning a trip to Bali and hyping up the arrival of Melvin. Young, attractive, 20 year old, American males are sort of hard to come by around here and the arrival of Melvin has sort of become the hot topic of conversation amongst the 17-25 year old female crowd. They want to see pictures, they want to know how old he is, what university he goes to, and what subjects he studies.

And because our lives are boring and mundane (and because we know this entire thing will embarrass him beyond all belief) we sort of encourage this fascination with Melvin. Last night we actually had an entire family gathered around us to ask about him. They were impressed by his willingness to visit our city (didn't mention that he thought he was just going to Bali when he agreed to go with my mom) and the fact that he will study architecture (this girls father is an architect). At the rate this is going I think we could arrange a marriage for Melvin before he even arrives and maybe even get the lucky girls family to pay for part of his plane ticket.

Now, we of course are looking out for him and have told the girls that Melvin does in fact have a girlfriend...