The Ten Commandments and Pigs-in-Blankets

Stacy had a "room mother" function tonight at L's preschool, so I had kiddie dinner duty. Rather than try to destroy the kitchen while the youngsters destroyed the rest of the house, I decided to inflict our brand of terrorism on some hapless commercial establishment. And since Mommy wasn't there to lay down all these bummer ideals about nutrition and well-balanced food pyramids and the like, we threw caution to the wind and went wild and crazy - yes, we went to IHOP! Pancakes for dinner?!? Daddy is brilliant!

On the way there I mentioned that I probably needed to stop at the bank ATM to get some cash. L asked why. I told her we would need to pay for dinner; we couldn't just eat and leave without paying. That would be stealing. Just like we read in church every Sunday: "Thou shall not steal."

At that, N's head popped up: "That's Pastor Greg words!" he said.

L chimed in: "That's right. Thou shall not steal, AND you shouldn't take someone's donkey! Or their cows or Aunt Claudia's two birdies." An interesting take on covetousness, I must admit.

The kids were actually unnaturally humane in the restaurant. I had this sneaking suspicion that I was flirting with disaster with the whole idea, but I actually pulled it off rather handily. L, of course, did need to go potty as soon as we got there, so I had to drag both of them to the bathroom and deny L her request for "privacy, please." N assured me he didn't need to go. Ten minutes after we got back to the table, however, N realized the floodgates were opening after all, so we three made the trek back to the men's room for round two. (At least he did go.)

N ordered strawberry waffles which came with whipped cream; L had blueberry pancakes with a gallon of blue syrup. I wrestled with the grueling choice between pigs-in-blankets and an international omelet. (The piggies won.) Once everything arrived, it was all doused even more liberally with the 17 different syrups at the table, and we dug in. N's waffle was larger than his head and he polished it off. I grew teary with pride. L ate all the blueberries and syrup off hers and was done. By the end of our meal we looked like a human French flag: N on my left was strawberry red from head to toe; L on my right was a giant, sticky, blueberry mess. Liberté, égalité, fraternité! After we paid the bill it took a third trip to the bathroom to do a sucrose purging of all exposed body parts.

...And yes, we did pay the bill. And we did not sneak off with any donkeys-in-blankets either.