Ever find your fridge and pantry depleted of food and for lack of time and energy you simply end up eating out? That was sort of how our weekend went.
Justin had a hockey clinic on Saturday morning immediately after which I needed to take my Dad and his wife to the airport. This meant that I had to miss the first of Sam's last two soccer games. Grandma was also planning to come up to watch that afternoon. In the midst of all the running around we simply had no time to go grocery shopping. Justin, however, had a $25 gift card for Red Lobster he was dying to use and one of Grandma's secondary goals on this visit was to help him use it. My sister and brother-in-law were invited along and the foursome headed off to eat dinner. Bird and I looked around and, of course, found very little to eat and we figured it would only be fitting if we took Sam out somewhere.
If you ask Sam where he wants to go he will invariably answer Broadway Pizza. This is primarily because of their scrumptious cookie dessert. It's a large, fresh baked, chocolate chip cookie still hot in the pan and piled with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream. The whole family will usually eat two of them, but tonight it's only us three so we ordered just one cookie. This was a mistake. For a seven year old the table tops are usually a little high and tonight we actually were seated at a high top table in the bar area forcing Sam to extend even more than usual. This was a mistake. His shoes kept getting kicked off falling onto to the floor and he was up and down off the chair like a yo-yo fetching them. Irritating little shit. I felt a little bad for him so when the cookie arrived I scooted it closer to him. Do I even need to mention this was a mistake? Apparently the pizza appetizer did nothing for him, because he tore into the dessert like he hadn't been fed in a week, and because the high table was forcing his arms up his elbow and hand were stuck way out to the side blocking my approach to the dish! I wanted to throttle the little... was actually a little perturbed by having to constantly parry and dodge his darting fist to get anything for myself in this escalating exchange of dessert-mongering. The people next to us looked over at the sounds of spoons clinking in our display of sword fighting frenzy. I believe it was over in less than a minute and on this point I shit you not. The evidence surrounded the dish as bits of chocolate, drops of vanilla ice cream, and dabs of whipped cream lay all over the table. Sam sat back with a grin of achievement and a relaxed posture of pure satisfaction. Good gawd! What a pig. I blame Bird...
As it turns out Justin was having a similar good time at Red Lobster. Apparently with a pound of crab legs before him Justin wasted no time diving in. Napkins are for losers and utensils are a complete waste of time. Grandma was helping him through the knuckles and would no sooner make a little pile of crab meat on his plate than his whole head would come down and ..whomp.. he'd devour it without even using his hands. I'm told it was quite entertaining. The server made multiple trips to the table to observe the spectacle that was my son and even brought the manager over once to see his delightful eagerness with his seafood. I also hear my sister was holding her unfolded napkin in front of her in an attempt to shield herself from the debris. Good gawd! This is sounding familiar and I can't really blame Bird after all. I'd actually like it if they ate like this at home sometimes.
Grandma stayed over night and this morning we all went out to Granite City for the brunch buffet. We had a $50 gift card and thought this the best way to save a little money. Both boys were much subdued from their previous evenings' meals. Worn out I'd guess. This was our first opportunity together as a whole to take it easy and to exchange these lovely stories. After the check was paid Sam proclaimed how much he loved brunch by saying, "Except for Broadway this is my most favorite restaurant. Oh! and Florida." While this struck me as comical I'm older now and decided to just let it go.
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