Playground Drama

[Clodfobble]

So I'm in the Chick-Fil-A this afternoon (for you non-Americans, that's a fast food place that prides itself on serving no beef, only chicken), with 3 other mothers and all the requisite offspring, totalling 7 children under the age of 5.

The playscape was especially crowded, at least 15 kids in a relatively small area. Three of these kids were much older than the rest, 9 or 10 year old boys, who shouldn't have even been in there in the first place. Especially because they were playing a very rough game of tag through/around the playscape. The little kids were getting shoved out of the way at best, and when one got knocked on the head and began to cry, one of the mothers I was with tried to ask the boys to stop playing so rough. Whether they didn't or wouldn't hear is up for debate. Regardless, she finally went to the counter to ask a staff member to tell them they had to stop. (Actually, she rock-paper-scissored with another mother for the dreaded task.)

Guy comes over, tells the boys they have to settle down. At this point, their mother--who had been in the play area all along, apparently--steps forward and begins making a scene, about how she's offended that someone went to the staff instead of coming to her first. Apparently A.) we were supposed to know they belonged to her, and B.) watching us tell her children in vain to stop shoving toddlers, let alone watching her child obviously injure one of those toddlers, wasn't enough for her to take action on her own.

He says, "Look, I'm just saying they have to play more carefully. If you're going to stand here and argue about it, the boys will just have to leave the playscape." She says, "You can't throw us out of here! This is a public place and we paid to eat here!" and asks to see the general manager. Over the course of the next few minutes, she gets on the phone with the corporate headquarters to file a formal complaint, and threaten to sue, because of the store's blatantly racist actions.

Oh yeah. By the way, she was Hispanic. Apparently she thought this had relevance to the situation.

Anyway, after they finally left in a huff, the store manager got all our names and phone numbers as witnesses, just in case the corporate office takes the complaint seriously.