other people's kids

Yesterday little e and I went to an indoor playground with his pal Henry and Henry's mom. We thought we'd get there early to avoid the madness, but apparently everyone else had the same idea.

The place was a zoo. There were tubes, ladders, slides with kids climbing and hanging off them like little monkies. We went to the toddler area to avoid a big-kid foot in the face. No such luck. The big kids had taken over the tot area too. At one point little e was crawling through this tube when a kid about six or seven started to CRAWL OVER him. Of course his mom was no where in sight to tell her child that maybe he shouldn't be crawling on top of a baby, so I took it upon myself. "Um, yes, exuse me, small child...can you wait til my son gets through before you take your turn." Sadly, the child must've been deaf because why else would he have five seconds later done the EXACT SAME THING AGAIN!!

So we moved on to the gym where there were balls, balls and more balls. However, there were little kids flying around on scooters too. And so what if there was a small toddler in their path?? It was a danger zone. But we stuck it out so the boy could shoot some hoops. And shoot some hoops he did while every other kid tried to steal the ball from him the minute it left his pudgy little hands.

So, here's my confession: Other people's kids really annoy me. Oh, I know, kids will be kids, but what about the little girl in the corner of the gym who monopolized each and every colored cone? My little boy wanted to use two to practice his soccer cone drills and she yanked them away from him like she was some kind of Queen of the Cones. To me, she was just a cone pig -- a cone pig who wouldn't share with my child!!!

Wait, let me clarify my confession. Of course my nieces and nephews don't annoy me -- or any children of my friends. I think more realistically it's other people who annoy me -- the mother of these kids who don't step in and say, "Little Johnny, maybe you shouldn't plow over that little boy with your scooter." Or, "You know, he's less than half your size, maybe you can give him his ball back..." Or the moms who come to the park and sit at the picnic table while the nice lady with the little boy pushes their child on the swing because the child is whining uncontrollablly to be pushed but their mama can't hear them because she's sitting a block away at a picnic table!!!

Okay, I digress. Little e had a blast at the indoor playground -- he was exhausted by the time we left and that was really the whole point. And there were some very nice kids -- big kids who quickly returned the ball to him with a big smile. Besides, I'm sure there will come a day (if there hasn't already) that he will annoy some other kid's mom.

Nahh, that will never happen.