"Lunch"

This happened yesterday, when I met a friend for lunch, but it could describe any of our trips out for lunch.

We arrive at our second lunch destination of the day (there was an incident with a fireguard at the first one that meant we had to leave) and find ourselves a table. Daisy and Zachary spot the bowl of sugar lumps and start eating them whole.  I let them: I can’t deal with the fallout if I try and stop them, plus it’ll keep them quiet long enough for me to have an actual grown up conversation. 

Ha.

 

Two minutes in, Zachary, bored with the sugar, salt, pepper and water concoction he’s been making, declares “I NEED A WEE!” (All things toilet must be shouted as loudly as possible so everyone in a 5 kilometre radius knows that my son needs a piss.)

Daisy, of course, decides she needs a wee too.  A toilet trip isn’t a toilet trip if the whole family isn’t present. They drag me to the toilet where Zach decides he doesn’t actually need a wee, but he does need to locate the cleaning products and attempt to take the lids off all of them (while I begin the inevitable countdown: ‘Mummy is counting to five Zachary.  You need to put the bottles back by the time I get to five.  1…2…Daisy I do not need your help thank you…3…there’ll be no sweeties after lunch if you don’t put them down Zachary…4…4 ½…give me the sodding bottles Zachary. Now.  Thank you.’) 

Daisy meanwhile sits on the toilet and narrates what’s she’s doing because Daisy narrates everything she does, all the live long day.  ‘I doing a wee mummy.  It’s just a little wee wee.  I can hear the wee wee.  Can you hear the wee wee mummy? It goes shhhhhhh. Do you need a wee wee mummy? Why not? I have a bot bot mummy.  Do you have a bot bot? Why? Zacchy has a winky mummy. I don’t have a winky.  Do you have a winky? Why not mummy? I want a winky. Winkies are FUNNY mummy.’

Having had his cleaning products confiscated, Zachary is getting bored listening to Daisy’s monologue, so decides to try and push her off the toilet.  I decide we’ve spent enough time on this particular toilet trip, hurry things along and drag them back to the table.

An angry row breaks out about who is sitting in which seat.  Daisy shrieks like a rabid monkey and Zach bellows ‘CHAIR!  IT’S MY CHAIR!’  I threaten highchairs if they don’t sit in a bloody chair in the next 5 seconds and soon we are all sat back down again.

I manage to order some food and get about three words out before Zachary bellows ‘I NEED A POO MUMMY! I NEED A POO!’  I sigh, get back up and return to the loo.  He sits on the toilet for about ten seconds before declaring ‘I don’t need a poo mummy.’  He gets off the loo and makes for the cleaning products, but mama ain’t no fool Zachary, and I drag him out of there before he can get his mitts on them again.

Back at the table, the food has arrived.  Five minutes is spent on splitting the one plate of food I’ve bought D&Z exactly in half.  No-one may have even half a slice of cucumber more than the other person because ‘THAT IS NOT FAIR MUMMY!’  I then sit down and have approximately two and a half bites of my food before Zachary bellows ‘I NEED A POO MUMMY!’

For.  Fuck’s. Sake.

Back in the loo, back on the loo, Zachary finds the toilet brush.  There follows a scuffle between the two of us (I’m done with countdowns by this stage) while I wrestle the bastard toilet brush out of his tiny vice like grip, at the same time as holding him up so he doesn’t fall into the loo. I win the wrestle and return the toilet brush to its rightful location.

Zachary tells me he doesn’t need a poo.  I swear.  We go back to the table.

I shit you not, I have one more mouthful and he tells me he needs a poo again.  Some of you might be thinking ‘Oh she’s an idiot. He obviously doesn’t need a poo. He’s just messing her around.’ Once.  Once in my life have I called his bluff when he’s been playing toilet silly buggers when we’re out for lunch, and do you know what he did? Pissed all over the place.  My son is more than prepared to perform a public revenge wee - or indeed – shit, if I don’t play his toilet game.

We trudge back to the toilet. He doesn’t shit.

I give up.  My friend, her son and Daisy have all finished eating and my friend’s paid the bill.  Zach couldn’t give two fucks about having anything to eat, and if we spend any more time here, I’m going to have to go to the toilet for a fifth time and I just can’t handle that.  My “lunch” has been 3 ½ mouthfuls of food and 40 minutes of hanging out in a toilet. We leave.

And that, my friends, is the reality of what lunch out with small children is like.