First class please....

A child is a curly, dimpled lunatic.  -Ralph Waldo Emerson

In America there are two classes of travel - first class, and with children.  -Robert Benchley

You can learn many things from children.  How much patience you have, for instance.  -Franklin P. Jones

These three quotes sum up my evening, as well half of my days for that matter.

I am replaying my evening in my mind, over and over again. Did I really witness all of those things in Cracker Barrel tonight? No, it can't be; People don't sit idly by while their children act in such a manner, do they? Yes, they do, and tonight was proof. A solid thumbs down to that discovery.

My husband and I get seated in the restaurant, we get our drinks and start reading the menus. There is a group of 11 about 20 feet from us at another table. There were three adult women, two 'tween/teen' children, three 6-8 year olds, one 2 year old, and two 1 year olds. These ages are based on my expert age gauging skills, learned from working in preschools for so long.

Both one year olds are screaming, probably because it was 9:30 PM, and they were tired. They were being passed like rag dolls between the three 6-8 year old girls, who had no business holding an animal, let alone a human being. The 6-8 year olds are also fighting over who is going to hold which screaming one year old. The two 'tween/teen' girls were bickering back and forth at a somewhat audible tone. Something over karate I think, but I really couldn't hear it clearly over the one's extremely 'Snooki-esque' poof. The two year old has a seat, with a booster seat in it. He is sitting on the edge of the booster seat, rocking it back and forth, screaming bloody murder. When the 'mother' told him to sit down/be quiet/stop he started screaming even louder at her to shut up. She did nothing. He then took his shoes off, and hung them on the top of the chair rails, he's still standing, as well as still screaming. The next thing I see is a full juice box go flying across the dining area. A 6-8 year old smacks the boy, and goes to retrieve the juice box. So, of course he screams louder, and throws a handful of macaroni and cheese at her. She was wearing white capri's, poor thing. The tween/teen girls are taking a different younger child to the bathroom about ever 7 minutes, obnoxiously. Mom is speaking away to the other two women, in her own world. The 6-8 year olds are now at other empty tables  in the dining room, stacking the hurricane globes of of lit candles, as well as the Cracker Barrel peg games.

Throughout the course of our dinner, any of the given items above were repeated around 3-7 times, or were constant. The screaming for example, was a constant out of at least two children at a time. Mom is sitting there, oblivious, or in complete denial that this was happening to her. She came to when there wasn't enough raspberry flavoring in her tea though, gosh golly, that certainly snapped her into reality.

I was so focused on the peg game at our table, so as not to go flip the 2 year old boy out of his seat, that I am surprised my channeled energy did not levitate that thing right off the table. Cracker Barrel is an open floor plan, no matter where we would have asked to be moved, you would have been able to hear the screaming. It was pointless. I honestly cannot even remember what type of cheese I ordered for my eggs, or if I ate hash browns or a hash casserole. I love the casserole, so I hope that's what I ordered. Yes, it was that loud. I am not exaggerating, there were a few octaves that made my vision blur.

When we were done telling the waitress how much her patience amazed us, we high tailed it out of there. I wanted to give the mother a piece of my mind, but my husband advised against it, as I tend to get carried away in those situations. We found a middle ground in our debate, and I flipped the mother the bird for a good 45 seconds as we were leaving. I didn't get to say my piece, but my patented Kitty-stink-eye paired with the bird probably got my point across to that lazy potato sack. Had I known what vehicle she was driving, I would have written her a nice note, and stuck it under her windshield wiper.

How can you let your children act that way in public? A two year old telling his mother to shut up? I cannot wrap my mind around it. Judging by her reaction, or lack there of, this was the norm for them.

If I were at that table, things would have gone a bit differently. I would have been hosting the bathroom trips; Just sayin'.