The Aerie
Thumbing our noses at the terrorists, my family spent a whole day at one of their Top Target Locations: Camp Snoopy at the Mall of America.
Their aunts had given my kids Christmas gifts of ride and purchase coupons, and the incipient heat of the day plus my youngest son's persistent nagging inspired us to use them. 'Twas mostly a pleasant experience. I don't think I'd've been able to enjoy it if I weren't on Grand Extended Vacation, but I am, so I did.
My favorite camping spot at Camp Snoopy is on these fairly comfortable booths just inwards from Legoland, and conveniently located right next to a bakery. Many of the seats at the MOA are designed to be uncomfortable - the chairs in the food courts are, for example, tipped forward to limit your time in them - but these booths are quite comfortable even though they are not padded. We arrived early at the MOA and got Rock Star Parking - second stall next to the doors - and grabbed a booth.
Shortly after we arrived we actually bumped into one of the aunts who provided the Camp Snoopy coupons. They had managed to convince their eldest to skip a sweltering outdoor carnival by promising the air conditioned Camp Snoopy instead.
At one point I left my wife and her sister to chat while her husband took one of their boys, and I took the other. Their Andy is my special nephew because, like me, he's adopted. His siblings fore and aft are born to their mother, but he was adopted with great difficulty from Russia. He's a charming, energetic fellow, and I followed him for about 45 minutes as he tore a path across Camp Snoopy and around the Mall of America, all the way up to the third level of Nordstrom's. I managed to convince him to board the glass elevator back down while he gazed, rapt, at the Mighty Axe ride.
After they left we had several pleasant hours. The kids came and went, riding the rides, begging for food money, etc. Then we decided on a whim to go and catch "The Fantastic Four" in the cinema. Afterwards we established ourselves in Barnes and Noble while my wife took our youngest for more rides.
About half an hour later she called my cell. Cell phones can be wonderful things. Our youngest was delayed inside the "Spongebob" ride, but we would leave when he got out of the ride.
Half an hour later she called again - how long does the "Spongebob" ride take?
Our youngest had gone missing.
We all gathered near the ride with a Mall security guard, who took a description of our boy, his braided rat-tail a good distinguishing characteristic. Then we split up and started searching.
Thirty minutes later we had circumnavigated Camp Snoopy once, inspecting all the video arcades along the way, and then my eldest son and I searched the fourth-floor video arcades where the youngest was very unlikely to have gone.
By the time the two of us had returned to the exit of the Spongebob ride, I had started to fantasize about all the brutal and painful ways that I would be killing anyone who had harmed my boy. I had settled on smuggling a hard plastic knife into the court proceedings and cutting the fellow's throat from behind when my cell phone rang.
My wife and daughter had found him, wandering around Camp Snoopy. We must have passed him three times, at least.
Dinner now completely gone awry, we purchased Subway sandwiches and headed home. It was a very long day at Camp Snoopy.
Posted by Albatross at July 10, 2005 9:50 PM