This week, I’m taking a break from blogging about my revision of “Ms. Dee Ann” (possibly to be renamed “Ms. Dee Ann Meets Murder”). I’ve recently come off a ten-day vacation with grandchildren and am still reeling from all the fun I had.

I use the word “reeling” here because hanging out with my grandchildren is not for the faint of heart. They’re good little people for the most part—a few karate chops and kicks at siblings aside—but they are active with a capital A.

Most kids are, but when you’re a 60-something grandma who is used to a quiet life with plenty of downtime, the activities these grandchildren drag their grandma into (I’m talking about me here!) are sometimes out of her comfort zone.

My column this week in the Rocky Mount Telegram details some of what I’m talking about.  (Click on the tab above marked Patsy’s Columns or the link below.) What I couldn’t put in the Telegram are the photos:

Yes, that’s me, the only other adult on the dance floor with the very glamorous current Miss North Carolina. I’m holding hands with my five-year-old grandson as we’re trying to do the Electric Slide.  That’s his big sister, my oldest grandchild who’s eleven, to his left.  Read this week’s column to learn how I found myself on a parquet dance floor at the Wrightsville Beach Holiday Inn with a beauty pageant winner and a bunch of kids. www.rockymounttelegram.com/Patsy-Pridgen

This photo shows me going down the pool slide at a resort in Myrtle Beach. Actually someone snapped this picture a couple of summers ago, but again, I was under the influence of grandchildren, who had wheedled me into such a stunt.  Nothing, I repeat NOTHING, I would ever have done had I been at this hotel without them.

My grandchildren trigger my usually dormant sense of adventure. They pull me into places and situations where I wouldn’t go by myself.  So what if they leave me reeling?  I go home to rest up for the next adventure.