Saturday, September 15, 2007

Hairspray Recuperation

I've been watching all 4 of my children whilst my wife is on sabbatical, its been a week and there is respite in site. She gets home tonight. They are young, all under 6 years old, the youngest being one. I can hardly see how their being "young" is any reason for them to act like gremlins. My plan has been just to stay in the house and throw food at them and change the TV station ever so often to keep them within its tractor beam. Well, Yesterday They began to become desensitized to the effect of Noggin television and began to talk to me. I figured we all needed to get out of the house to see if there was still a sun in the sky. The Plan: load them up and take them to the 4:15 showing of Hairspray. We made it to the theatre, I bought the tickets while the four year old corralled the two year old and kept constant back pressure on her arm to keep her from darting out into the parking lot. Much to my dismay/delight some nice, older, respected folks from our church turned up and we discovered we were going to the same movie.
Keeping with my "throw food at them" technique I stopped by concessions to buy some popcorn, twizzlers, kitcat one large SPRITE for them and one large DR. Pepper for me. (light substance abuse is my key to happiness) The gentlemen we knew from the ward could tell I had my hands full and offered to carry the libations to the theatre while I herded the children in the same direction.
There was nobody in the theatre and the previews were going. Perfect, I thought If my kids talk a little there wont be anyone to annoy other than the couple behind us from church; and since they've seen us at church they'll know what to expect :). The kids made it through the previews. About five minutes into the movie I looked down my row and congratulated myself on mission accomplished. Three girls all sat mesmerized; popcorn and sucking on licorice with an occasional sip of the communal sprite. My son, the 1 year old was on my lap calm as could be, watching the movie. I had made it to Nirvana.
A group of about 10 teenage girls walked in to the move just as it was starting and took there seats directly in front of us.
I must have become temporarily complacent as the next thing i knew I looked down and my son was sipping on my Dr. Pepper. Oh dear, I thought he might have trouble getting to sleep tonight. At least he was happy. five minutes later he lost his mind. He was standing on my knees bobbing up and down, jamming out to the music in the movie. Then he was down walking in the isle High Fiving each of his sisters on his way to the end of the row. Now he is on the stairs crawling up to the top of the stairs and back down, then back up and back down again, and again, and... again. well at least hes not bugging anyone. He poorly negotiated one step coming down and tumbled a few levels. He cried so I went and got him and took him to the door way to calm him down. Now that I have left the isle, the girls have decided to follow their brothers example of climbing up and down the stairs. My son wanted down so he could go party some more so he payed a visit to the teenage girls sitting in front of us and they humored him by cooing and saying high as he crawled (on the floor) down their row. At this point my two year old picked up the large cup o sprite and dropped it on the floor spraying sprite all over the unsuspecting girls in front of us. I exclaimed my apologies, grabbed the two year old (now crying) and reached over the seats and picked up the one year old who had clearly deposited a stool sample in his britches.
I was now rather embarrassed as the couple from our ward sat like statues trying to pretend they didn't notice the mayhem. They've seen this at church so their used to it.
I took the kids, through them in the car and squealed the tires as we left. All the kids went to bed at 6:30 right when we got home. I am still trying to recuperated from my enjoyable day with my kids.

3 comments:

April said...

Matt, Matt, Matt,
Thank goodness for Melissa's swift return...need I say more? Are you moving to The Woodlands or what? Go back, I'm posting reasons why you should move...

April said...

His other favorite line is "I'll never be Paul again, all because of a giant weiner!" She's coming to the Toyota Center 11 November...just one more reason to come to Houston!

re: layout...great minds think alike. Need we say more?

BugHunter said...

So, it would seem that my own brother is one of "those" people.