NO ADULTS ALLOWED!

I've decided to boycott Chic-fil-A for a while. Well, the restaurant portion, not the drive-thru...Don't get me wrong- I love some nuggets and a big fat fountain coke zero! But after last week, it's a done deal.

Well, we're really boycotting any restaurant with a play place but Chic-fil-A was the only place that I let Emily Grace play in the play place until now. Of all of the restaurants, I felt it was the least-germy. I'm probably very wrong because other parents most likely feel the same and so more children are probably in there spreading more germs than in other plastic microbe incubators. Gah- talking about this makes me want a CLOROX WIPE!

I digress...

Anyway, twice last week Emily Grace got invited to play dates at Chic-fil-A. And twice we accepted. Both times I tried to sit out of view from the nasty germ-infested plastic paradise but alas, she is too smart. She knows where we are when we go there. She knows Chic-fil-A comes with chocolate milk and a slide. OH dear. So, I let her go play, waiting with the gallon of purell at my side.

So day 1- Tuesday: Long story short, she got to the top while I waited and watched anxiously from the safe side of the plexiglass of hygiene. Something happened, I have no idea what, but all of a sudden she was sitting on the top-most shelf, crying. Actually, she was bawling. Alligator tears were FLOWING down her sad, plump little cheeks. I couldn't get in there fast enough!!! Another mom, who invited us, was in there and helped me get to her. I don't even remember what happened. I feel like I was tossing little kids to the side in my attempt to get to her. But, we got her out, I bathed her in purell and she ate her ice cream and we went home (where I later boiled all of our clothes to combat the contamination that had seeped into the fibers).

Day 2- Wednesday: We went to the Natural Science Center with some friends and then headed to the dreaded Chic-fil-A. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy hearing "it's my pleasure ma'am!" every 3o seconds, but at this point, I was DREADING what was inevitably going to happen when the nuggets and chocolate milk ran out. The other moms delicately said "it really can't be that bad -surely that won't happen again!" Ok, sure, let's see how it goes. I'm laid back- let's give it another try. Afterall, the best way to get over a fear of heights (or germs) is to face it, right? WRONGO! She freaked again. She got to the top and you would have thought someone kicked her in the stomach! By the time I climbed through the tunnel of crud to reach my sweet little angel she was a wreck! But on my way up, some snotty-nosed little kid intercepted me- you know the kind- like Minkus from "Boy meets world..." He was the know-it-all who spits when he talks and has snot constantly pouring from his nose, that he wipes with the palm of his hand, that then touches EVERYTHING! So he sits on his knees, watching this drama unfold, seeing my dying rush to reach out to my child and says "HEY LADY! NO ADULTS ALLOWED!" My response should have been "KID! I COULD SIT ON YOU!" But, instead, I just said, "my little girl is crying and I need to get her down (PUNK!), so it's ok that I'm in here." Then the genius kid says in a mocking sort of voice "she should just go down the slide to get down!" Really smarty pants? That's how this thing works? I HAD NO IDEA! I couldn't believe that I was mentally arguing with a Minkus-like 6-year old. Really- who breeds and ends up with him??? I wanted to punch the snot right off of his face for getting between me and my Emmy! But he was what, 6? And I'm the adult here, so restraint was in order... But who lets their kid approach an adult with "HEY LADY!" Needless to say, I had a hard time fighting the urge to pour Purell all over his head like the slime from Nickelodeon! Little ratty germ terd! Wait, I'm the adult, scratch that last part... but notice that I didn't delete it. :)

So I finally reached my little Emmy Gu. Those sad little cheeks were once again covered in giant, flowing tears. I hugged my sweet little angel and we climbed down together. I told her that it was ok to be afraid but it would be a VERY long time before we went back to Chic-fil-a, at least the inside part where the slide was. She finally admitted it was scary in there and agreed that we didn't need to rush back. ((We'll never stop going to the drive-thru though!)) And One day, a long LONG time from now, we'll try it again. But for now, we need to work through her fear of heights and my fear of germs.

Back to clothes-boiling and the drive-thru line!