The very sense of irony

Once a year Jeff and I will take the day off from work and spend the day together while the kids are at school.  It's awesome to feel like we are playing hooky and enjoy going out when the rest of the world is busy at school or work.   If you haven't done this with your significant other, I highly recommend it!

This past Monday was our day date.  We made plans to go to the movies and see "The Long Shot".  It's a funny movie and the perfect choice for Jeff and me.  I am truly a middle school boy at heart and really appreciate Seth Rogen's sense of humor.  It's not for everyone, but I don't get easily offended and laughed through the whole thing.  Jeff did too so it's good I've got a partner in crime.

Imagine our surprise as we take our seats and watch the 11:00am show fill up with moms and babies.  Lots of moms and babies!!  Jeff and I managed to stumble upon the baby friendly showing at the movie theatre.  I am all too familiar with this special kind of showing.  I used to take Ian and Sam to the movies all the time when they were infants at a different nearby theatre.  It's pretty awesome and a great way to get out of the house and still watch the latest movies.  The theatre does not turn the lights all the way down, there are strollers everywhere when you walk right in, and more moms than you can count feeding their babies and getting them to fall asleep during the movie.  I do think they even shorten the amount of time of previews before the film starts.  Normally, the standard has been 20 minutes worth and this showing had about 10 minutes.

I remember one showing I was at (years and years ago) when they stopped the film temporarily and the manager made an announcement that the local public schools have called for a Winter weather advisory and they are letting school out early due to the impending storm.  The manager wanted us to know in case anyone had school-age children they needed to go get.  It is really awesome how accommodating they are for this particular demographic, who I'm sure at some point never thought they'd be in a movie theatre again after just having had a baby.

Anyway, I digress.  Jeff and I couldn't help but laugh at the irony of all this.  We intentionally went out while our kids were at school and here we are surrounded by at least 30 moms and their infants.  For the most part, they were all good.  The few that couldn't settle down left and came back once they were quiet.

But the best thing about being surrounded by these babies?  They weren't ours and we could leave the movie theatre and go back to having our 2 kids who are in 5th and 8th grade.  I think Jeff agrees with me that we are so happy to be beyond the baby stage.  :)