more babysitting adventures

Ever wondered what it was like to drive around with 3 kids in the car yelling "We're lost! We're lost! We're lost!"? Yeah me neither. But fortunately for me, now I never have to.

Babysitting for my cousin involves watching 3 future-stunt-doubles. (If they end up doing anything besides becoming professional stunt doubles, they are not using all of the gifts God gave them, which include but are not limited to: the ability and desire to climb everything......and then jump off, and not have a scratch on them, as well as the energy equivalent of a million mortal men) Today's task included taking them to their dance class.

Ok, no problem.

Except that today, the road that my cousin told me to take to get to the class was blocked off for a parade.

Ok, no problem. Just go around.

That's when I found out that kids, even though they don't know street names or directions, can 'remember' the way to get to a certain place. Since we weren't taking the normal route, all I kept hearing was "I don't remember this place. Are we lost? Do you know how to get there? Are you sure you're going the right way? This is taking a long time. We should have been there by now. I think we're lost. I don't want to be lost." This eventually led to "WE'RE LOST!! WE'RE LOST!!" And no matter how many times I assured them we weren't lost, that I was just taking a different road because the road was closed, they would have none of it.

This created a problem. I think today was the first day that babysitting has made me not want to have kids. Ever. Granted, that was a brief moment, but I think I've reached a new plane on the whole "to have kids/not to have kids" question.

Another interesting thing happened today. While waiting for his two older sisters to finish their dance class, the youngest kid (GC) and I were walking around. Suddenly, a small dog escapes from his owner's grasp and runs toward GC. GC starts frantically running away and screaming at the top of his lungs. At first, this catches me completely off guard. Dogs run toward me all the time. They smell your crotch, maybe sniff your hand and then run away. What I later realized was that if something the size of a BEAR was running at me, I probably would have reacted in the exact same way. AND, I'm guessing he doesn't have a lot of interaction with dogs. I felt bad. He's probably scarred for life. I didn't really know what to do either, as they were running in circles around me. Do I try to grab the dog? Or do I try to grab the frantic kid who's running for his life? Didn't matter, by the time I started moving, the owner already had grabbed the dog. Yeah, I guess I'm not so decisive under pressure.