Dumpy Cup

Recently, we took the circus family to the circus.

Beforehand, we promised the boys they could each have one "reasonably-priced" souvenir (which was defined as 10 bucks or less.)

All Little Brother wanted was a balloon. Seriously. The boy is OBSESSED with balloons right now. And you know how I feel about (helium) balloons.

At intermission, I took the boys to pick out our souvenirs.

Big Brother was immediately drawn to a $20 light-up for 5 minutes then dead, irreplaceable batteries sword. Since there were basically no souvenirs under $10 (except for hot dogs at $9), we settled for a $12 rev-up motorcycle (that was actually pretty cool).

Then we set out to look for a balloon for Little Brother.

To my amazement, there was NOT A SINGLE BALLOON in the entire place. Not one. But I did get at least a mile of excercise carrying him around the area (twice) to make sure we didn't miss any balloons.

(C'mon, when we went to Sesame Street Live, at intermission a guy walked right down the middle aisle with a giant plume of $25 Elmo balloons. Throw me a balloon bone here.)

Little Brother was DEVASTATED. And by devastated, I mean an uncontrollable flowing river of crocodile tears.

Knowing his penchant for liquid refreshment, I set our sights on a $12 Tri-colored Snow cone Tiger Stein.



(Yes, go ahead and laugh at me for paying $12 for a snow cone. I laughed at my buddy who shelled out $17 for a popcorn for his daughters. Merchandizing. Merchandizing. Where the real money from the Circus is made.)


(I didn't find any Circus the Flamethrowers, however. Kudos to you if you catch my movie reference.)


But the Tiger Stein was a good move. It satisfied Little Brother's craving for a souvenir and "fink". And now I have a tie-dyed pair of jeans, from all of the snow cone that he spilled on me.

For about a week after the circus, Little Brother would only drink "chocky juice" from his Tiger Stein, which he affectionately referred to as his "Dumpy Cup". (Fortunately, no contents were ever actually dumped, despite high levels of parental fears about a 3 year-old and a cup with no lid.)

He was so proud of his Dumpy Cup, that on the way out of the circus, we saw the elephant tent. Little Brother raced over there, and exclaimed, "Hey elephants! Look! I have a Dumpy Cup!"

He didn't sleep with the Dumpy Cup next to his pillow, but came close.


Of course, as Mom-E and I predicted, after about a week, the Dumpy Cup spontaneously fell out of favor, and has since been replaced with a blue Nalgene bottle.


Oh, how fickle the fancies of our children are.


I guess his preoccupation with his Dumpy Cup lasted about as long as the batteries would've worked in that sword.


Perhaps we need a new rule for souvenirs. You can have it if it costs less than $10, and you sign this contract that you will play with it every day from now until you turn 18.


See you on Friday,
From our circus to yours,
Busy-Dad-E