I took Bubba to the fair Saturday evening and while in line to ride "The Bump Cars" (Bubba's reference to the crash-up-derby ride which I thought should be called Shatter Dad's Kneecaps) found myself getting further and further from the entrance to the ride. After the third parent with three kids in tow apparently related to the mother with two kids in front of me cut in line I decided I wasn't going to take the injustice to Bubba and politely tapped the teenage girl with toddler in front of me (hoping it was a brother or cousin) an said,
"If you would like to ride this ride you can wait like everyone else. My son and I have been waiting patiently here and you can do the same at the end of the line. If you have a problem with this we can call over the fair authorities whom I'm sure will tell you that cutting in line is not good fair etiquette. Your other option is for me to create a huge scene about how you are rude and inconsiderate of other people's children and should be publicly ridiculed for teaching all the children in this line that it is acceptable to NOT wait your turn!"
That is exactly how it went in my head...
If the in-my-head tirade had been out of head I was pretty confident I was going to find myself fending off 80% of the fair goers since they all seemed to be related and there with each other. Every freakin' line we waited in kept getting longer from the front! Each time the ride operator would start letting a new group on the ride a crowd of parents and kids would join one of the parents in front of me shoving their kids through the gate inevitably filling the entire ride making Bubba and I wait another round before getting on.
After multiple "whys" from Bubba on why it was taking so long I finally whispered in his ear, "Because people keep cutting in line which we do not do." I later regretted this because in one of the lines while I wasn't paying attention I think Bubba said something about line etiquette to one of the other daddies that was conveniently tattooed up with his "805" gang affiliations and seemed to have his entire posse with him in line. He laughed then looked up at me not laughing, to which I responded with a sheepish grin and shrugged my shoulders in a effort to say, "What-can-you-do-please-don't-stab-me."
If the line-cutting wasn't bad enough at least one mother (note never a father) in every line had a 60 second debate with the ride operator on one of two issues (60 seconds is a very long time by the way when you are going to make it on this ride but at any moment 15 relatives may show up and get on meaning you don't). She was either in disbelief that her 14 month old was not able to ride by himself (though there were dozens of posters and measuring signs clearing displaying you had to be at least 32" tall to ride) or she was irate that her child that was 32" tall could not ride alone and she had to buy a ticket for herself to ride with him (which was also posted clearly at every ride).
What I realized after about the third let-my-kid-on or I-don't-have-a-ticket debate was each mom knew the rules. I again had an in-my-head-tirade similar to the one above. During one very eloquent speech Bubba asked me, "Dada, you talkin' to yourself?". To which I responded "Yes" because I was apparently silently mouthing my tirade while staring at the mother hoping she would somehow hear my disdain through some sort of supernatural-pissed-off-dad-mind-meld. No dice though.
The ironic part of this experience was on about half the rides the ride operator stopped me on the way out to award me with a VIP ticket for a free ride. I think it was because I made Bubba say "Thank You" after each ride, but I also think it may be because I accidentally mind-melded with them instead of the aimed at mom so to make up for my suffering gave me a free ride in order that I could suffer the entire ordeal over again...
I had so many tickets left over I was able to award three girls with 9 ride tickets to which they very politely said, "Thank You". As I walked away I heard their squeals of joy as they told their friends they just got a bunch of free tickets, which made the night out with Bubba ever better.
