To Care Bear, or not to Care Bear...

So this afternoon, I was so hungry I was ready to simply start gnawing on my van’s armrests. If you could see my van, you’d know that this is the statement of a truly desperate woman. I think they were last cleaned sometime in 1998. I was desperate. Desperate, I tell you!

Anyway, I was so hungry, and so out of bread, and so not interested in anything out of the freezer, and so even less interested in cooking something, I decided to spring for Burger King on the way back from dropping Danger Mouse off at kindergarten.

Well, Burger King is currently giving out Care Bears in their kids meals. Oooh, aaaah. So, as I’m ordering, I hear from the depths of the van a little voice piping up with, “Oh, mommy, can I have one of those Care Bears? I wannit just so-so badly!” {pause} “And also, I’d like some juice because I’m hot.” {pause} “And mommy? I also need some chicken sticks, because I’m extwemewy hungwy.”

**sigh** She probably is, too, because like her mother she has not felt like eating what was on the table all day. Waffles? Eh. Cereal bar? Nah. Spaghetti-O’s? **yawn**

OK, so I order the kids meal. And I pull forward, and I pay for it, and we pull into the parking lot. And as I’m handing her the bag, I glance at the toy.

Uh-oh.

Not a Care Bear. It’s some kind of transformer thing, an airplane robot or something.

Oh dear.

Now, I’m not going into the store. Both of these kids are barefoot and frankly I’m just not in the mood. I also don’t want to go back through the drive-thru, which is doing a great impersonation of the freeway at rush hour. Hmm. Let’s try…enthusiasm!!

“Wow, check it out, honey! You got something special – you got an airplane! How cool is that?!”

Did I expect this to work? Oh, hell no. I do not have a single stupid child. I expected one of three things: to be doing one heckuva sales job, to be listening to a wailing preschooler all the way home, or to be sitting in the stalled drive-thru traffic so I could explain to the nice lady that we had wanted a Care Bear (and probably hear, when I was well and truly stuck in the line, that they were out of Care Bears).

She gave me a long, long look. She looked at the not-a-Care-Bear toy in my hand, then up at me, then back at the toy, then at me.

Then suddenly, she smiled. “Cool, an airplane!” she agreed. She took it from me and began making airplane noises, lisping the song from Sesame Street: “I’m a widdle airpwane now-wow-wow, I’m a widdle airpwane now-wow-WOW! Wangity-wang, wangity-wang, I'm a widdle airpwane NOW!”

Quickly, I sat down, belted up, and began driving. Whew. She ate her chicken nuggets, and her French fries, and drank her apple juice (and may I just state for the record that I am So Damned Happy that places are starting to give me juice options with kids meals?) with one hand while playing with the airplane with the other.

Wow.

I just…

I just absolutely, categorically cannot believe that actually worked!

I think I may have to rush out tonight and get a lottery ticket – because I am one lucky woman, today!!