Surviving the Circus

I'm not really a fan of the circus, but the kids sure like it. Also, I'm a bit mystified by the whole Shrine organization with their imperial council and illustrious potentate and their temples. And then there's their distinctive hats with the fez and tendencies to show up in parades driving bathtubs. None of these pieces give me a sense of what the organization as a whole might be like, but I'm completely amazed at their collection of hospitals where kids (regardless of whether they can afford it) can get needed medical treatment. Their philanthropy at least, I can definitely support.

My kids just like the idea of anything that feels like a celebration. The draw here is probably partially all the circus treats. The ridiculously over-priced circus treats that I usually never buy. This time I realized (as they were all begging for things) that in between all the baseball games and the ambulance calls and the shuffling back and forth between the kids' two houses and the last minute rushing that it was possible none of them had any real meals since noon. It was now after 7:00pm. Whipped, colored sugar was not really the best answer to this dilemma, but it did distract the kids from the problem for awhile.

Lex had been asking about going to the circus and talking about the circus all week. Then when we got to the circus, like so many things, it didn't quite seem to live up to his expectations.

He liked the cotton candy, even though he was really mad he had to share it.  The first act was the tigers and he thought they were really cool and he told me they were his favorite, except he wouldn't stop asking, "Where are the lions? Where are the lions!!? WHERE ARE THE LIONS?" throughout the entire tiger act and then sporadically throughout the rest of the show. The lions never showed up.

Next was the lady with a lot of hula hoops. He seemed interested in this for a few minutes, but then he leaned over and whispered in my ear, "Mom, she lost hers pants! Look at the lady down there. She lost them. No pants!" It was true. They did seems to be missing.

After the pant-less lady the camels arrived. I asked Lex if he knew what they were and he said yes. I asked what they were and he told me "buffalo." I tried to convince him they weren't buffalo, but he just thought they were really "tall, crazy buffalo." I guess the hump is a little familiar and there really aren't many other animals around here that look like camels.

After that he was pretty much done watching the circus and wanted to run around the entire field house in the dark, doing ninja rolls to avoid the light beams (from all those light up swords they sell for about twenty gazillion dollars a piece) and stealing slushies other circus goers left unguarded beside their seats. I'm hoping he didn't succeed in this, but I did lose him once and after about five minutes of panicked scanning of the entire surrounding seating area I spotted him (and eventually caught him) five rows up and one section over dodging light beams and sucking down a slurpie I didn't buy him. I should have never let him sit in his own seat once they turned off the lights without some sort of alarm/ alerting system. He spent the rest of the show sitting on my lap. Neither of us was very happy about this situation.

The other kids were much easier to manage since they didn't run away or even bother me about buying them things. They didn't even complain when I wouldn't let them do any of the fun circusy stuff at intermission. Instead of riding elephants and ponies they played fun games like, "How far away can we sit before the ushers come and tell us to return to the adult in charge?" This is how far Zoran and Iyezk made it:

There was also a session of who can make the craziest pictures with the fish eye lense. The kids thought Iyezk and Zoran won again: 

And of course Lex was up for a quick game of  "I'll now run away again since you've temporarily released your death-grip on me":

By the end of the evening I really wanted to leave him with the circus. He makes me crazy since we can't ever seem to agree with how a three-year-old should act in public. I wonder if the the circus needs any pant-less riders for their tall, crazy buffalos? I doubt he'd actually stick to the performance script, but maybe once he escapes, if he gets far enough away on that camel he can find them a lion.