Our So-Cal vacation campaign is a little past the halfway point, so I thought this would be a good time to report in. We flew in to San Diego on Tuesday the 9th, spent the night and went to Sea World the next day. I would like to say that we had a Shamu-velous time, but that story would be a little fishy. The whining and complaining started even before we had flown out of town, with my nine and four year olds arguing over a seat at the airport gate they both wanted to sit in. Wanting to deter a trip filled with low-level sniping, I went with the nuclear option immediately, threatening to keep them both with me at the hotel while their older brother and mom went to Sea World. They probably knew I was more full of hot air than Khrushchev, but didn't dare call my bluff.
At Sea World, we tried to go on some rides, but our four year old didn't want to go on anything that went up too high, dropped down too quickly, spun around too fast, got you wet, in short, any ride that was somewhat fun. Even when we rode the gondolas on a leisurely spin over the bay, he looked at me and asked, "what's so good about this ride?" I hate to say it, but I think my four year old son is sort of a curmudgeon. I used to think that only cranky old men could be curmudgeons, but my youngest might be some kind of Benjamin Button curmudgeon who's already an old grouch as a preschooler. Maybe when he's 85, he'll act like a happy-go-lucky toddler.
My youngest wasn't alone when it came to whining about our lunch at Sea World, however. We paid 60 dollars for the privilege of choking down soggy flatbread pizzas, "grilled" cheese that was more like chilled cheese, as it wasn't even melted in the middle, and a prepackaged pb&j sandwich with no crust that my 4 year old nibbled suspiciously. Even my wife joined in the chorus of complainers. Et tu Mommy? I thought as I glumly chewed on my sandwhich.
We drove to Anaheim that afternoon after leaving Sea World and went to Disneyland Thursday morning. Like magic, the happiest place on earth seemed to dispel all the whining and complaining. The walking around was less tiring, the lines were less unbearable, our lunch, while still $60, was more palatable. Our youngest went on some rides the older kids wanted to go on, and the older boys happily rode the teacups with our youngest.
Today we went to Universal Studios, which has something called "Child Switch" for some of their rides. It allows one parent to stay with their child while the other parent goes on a ride the kid is too little or too scared to go on. Then the first parent retrieves the child and the other parent gets to go to the front of the line and go on the ride without waiting back in line. Needless to say, we utilized "Child Switch" with our youngest son who was back to his anti-ride ways. It's a pretty neat idea, and it got me thinking of how to improve upon that concept. I came up with "Toddler Tranq" where you could tranquilize your recalcitrant youngsters for say 4-8 hours, leaving them in a comfy, secure, monitored pod, and leaving you free to enjoy the amusement park without whining about tired feet, bad food, being too hot, needing to go potty for the 9th time. Of course, I still need to work out some of the details, and the legal release forms, but I could be on to something.
Well, I need to sign off. We get to enter Disneyland an hour earlier than the general public tomorrow, which means we need to be ready to board the shuttle at 6:30 AM, and the park stays open until midnight, so I'm in for a very long day.
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