The Cold Shoulder

This is something from July I meant to talk about either on my podcast or my blog, but it slipped my mind.  Then I saw a photo I had taken, and it all came back to me.  

We went to what used to be called the San Diego Wild Animal Park (damned if I can remember what they rebranded it as: the San Diego Zoo Safari maybe?), and after being there for two hours, everybody gathered at a nice observation station, which had several tables and benches, a couple snack shacks, and the view of the artificial marshes and the animals that lived there.  For some reason, my five year old nephew relocated himself to underneath the table.  I missed what set him off, but he was pouting and angry*, and absolutely would not come out no matter who talked to him.  His dad demanded he get out of there, his brothers tried to coax him out, his mother tried to sweet-talk him out, I approached him and was told to get lost by the boy's father, and so now it was up to my niece and her boyfriend to give it a try.

Aaron had bought an overpriced milkshake and got down on his hands and knees, and tried to tempt the boy out by offering a taste of it.  He held it out to him, but my nephew didn't take it.  So Aaron stretched his arm out to make him try it . . . and somehow, he dumped the milkshake all over him (I suspect that he gripped it too tight and it exploded out the top, but I can never know for sure).  The boy had shake on his face, shirt, neck, and hair, and we tried not to laugh, knowing that would just set him off further.

But it didn't.  Now he had an excuse to come out (so he could get cleaned up), and all was forgiven.

I just wanted to share that with someone.  Thank you.

*I'm not really sure why--maybe they wouldn't buy him something, maybe he was tired, maybe he'd just been told that even though we'd paid sixty dollars a ticket, my sister and her husband wanted to leave already, having only seen a third of the park.  If it was the latter (something I found out a half hour later as everybody headed for the exits instead of the Asian side of the park), I absolutely could not blame him for pitching a fit.