Well, not really for him, but definitely in the "let's spend a shitload of money on a bigtime birthday party" department. The Boy turns 7 tomorrow. Because he was born in mid-March and the weather is always a total crapshoot, we have for the last few years scheduled a party for him at SOMEPLACE -- read: some expensive kids' gym or "kid-friendly environment." I left things up to Hubby two years ago and he scheduled a bowling party. This wasn't because anyone we know is into bowling -- it was because the bowling alley would serve beer. At the party. Although this made him the hero of every other father who had to drag his 4 or 5 year old to this party, it made me crazy because that was THAT much more I had to pay attention to.
So this year I saw that "Horton Hears a Who" was opening the weekend of The Boy's birthday. Thought that would be a relatively easy shindig -- get tickets, buy some popcorn and fruit punch and have pizza delivered. The theater made it sound really easy -- they provide the room, rope off the seats, deliver the popcorn and drinks right to the kids in the theater, and the party host handles all games etc for the duration of the party. Except that the party host we were expecting got the flu, and we ended up with some chick who could barely read your ticket and say "Theater 6." Out of the 2 1/2 hours she was supposed to be managing our party, I think she was there for maybe 40 minutes. She kept wandering off, and given that it was a weekend, the theater was pretty busy, so it was hard to spot her once she was more than 30 feet out. The theater manager will be getting a letter about how disappointed I was in how the party was described to us and how little services we actually received -- and I will be expecting a refund of the party host charge. I'm usually one to punt in any given situation, but this was ridiculous even by my standards.
The end-all of this is that next time I will just tell The Boy to pick four friends and I will take them all to see a movie. Hubby and UM can meet us there with DQ and the cousins. And I will take them home after or their parents can pick them up -- and we'll be done with it. It'll be about $300 cheaper.
That being said, the movie itself was phenomenal. I highly recommend it to everyone!! Loved Jim Carrey, Steve Carrell, and Carol Burnett doing the voices, and the animation was incredible. Very, very good stuff!! All of the kids loved it.
