Public Display

Don't ask me WHY I felt like running all over the city doing errands with the kids today. Today...FRIDAY...my ONLY weekday in which I do not keep any professional appointments in my office. But this is what I felt like doing, and so it is what I did.

I dressed the wee ones up on their matching pumpkin sweatshirts (it was Halloween today, after all) and off we went. They were very well behaved and tolerated my shopping in "boring" stores (as my daughter described them). I was looking for wall decor for my new office space at the clinic. As I unbuckled Dear Son from his carseat at about the third stop, he informed me, "I just detting some booders out of my nose." I sarcastically replied that this was "just great" and by the way, what did he do with those "booders?" His response, "I just put them on the floor in the car." Great again. Nonetheless, I was pleased that he got his nose pickin' done before we entered the store.

After the fourth or fifth stop the kids were hungry, and I still had more errands. Dear Son began asking "Tan we det a Happy Meal? PULEEEEZE? Tan we? Tan we?" I decided to indulge them because they had been so good while I shopped.

The lady wearing the McVisor was waiting at the counter when we walked in. I was holding Dear Son on my hip throughout the order process and then sat him on the counter as I dug in my purse for my wallet. He was busy with something, but I didn't pay much attention as I dug for the exact change to give the McVisor lady. That's when Dear Son screamed at the top of his lungs, "Look! Look! I dot a booder! It's a BID one!" and he waved his hand way above his head with a very large, pulsating, dark green booger stuck to the end of his left index finger. The thing was larger than his finger tip. I had to reply in order to get him to stop announcing it over and over and over again. Under my breath, trying NOT to draw any more attention to us, I said in my quietest but most validating voice, "Oh wow! That IS a big one!" as I snuck glances from side to side hoping and praying that no one was watching this event. If a McMeal doesn't turn stomachs on its own right, I'm sure the giant throbbing green booger at the McCounter could.

I, of course, had no tissue or napkin or anything in which to swiftly and casually capture this thing in. A few solutions raced through my mind. I could take it from his finger onto my own, thus ending his wild waving of it above his head, but then what would I do with it? I could wipe his finger on his pants, but the things was soooo large and I figured if someone were already all grossed out watching us, that could seem even grosser. I dared not wipe in on the McCounter, though I didn't figure I would be the first to do so. So I just pulled his little hand down closer to his body to not be quite so obvious about the giant booder. He complied...his little index finger still extended with the green glob on the end of it as he studied it. We made it to the condiment counter and Son continued to examine his treasure until whisked it away with the first napkin I could find. Then I put on my dark glasses and hustled the kids to the darkest and most remote corner in the joint and watched them munch their McBurgers.

I, on the other hand, had lost my appetite.