I found one in an upscale department store near where Robert and I used to live. They had little cars for the kids to sit in while their hair is being cut and cartoons playing on a TV in front of them. I felt pretty lucky as I walked in and saw that there wasn't a line-up. There also weren't any hairstylists. They must all take break at the same time, because there were only two receptionists that told me (well, more like showed me as they couldn't find anyone to translate), that there wasn't an available slot for another three hours. Forget that. Cheap side alley barber shop, here we come!
First Michael had to play on the firetruck. He took turns nicely with about five other little kids there. When it wasn't his turn, he climbed up the front or the back of the truck. I tried to avoid shopkeepers trying to sell me outrageously priced children's outfits.
Michael had been looking forward to getting his hair cut "in a car" (I have to prepare him long in advance as he hates getting his hair cut), so to placate him, I took him to his favourite store. It's called "The Good Toys" and they have a lot of high quality toys, including a Thomas wooden train set that kids can play on while their parents get given the sales pitch for every toy in the store. And that is what happened during the hour that Michael played (he has an amazing attention span when it comes to Thomas). Even though the saleslady didn't speak any English, she insisted on following me around and demonstrating anything that I glanced at. Since I was just using them for their train set, I figured I should be polite and let her, but it did get annoying after awhile. I ended up buying some cool bath toys for Jeremy and one of his cousins, as well as some nice supports for the sloping wooden train track pieces with a small straight piece of track on the top for the sloping pieces to connect to. They're so much better than the regular wooden block supports he has at home.
I figured the back alleys by where I live would be cheaper than the ones downtown, so we took a bus and found this barber shop with two ladies cutting men's hair and giving them a shave, so I knew that they could handle Michael. We had to wait awhile, but Michael was tired and didn't mind too much. They even went a got him a snack. When his turn came, they put a beam across the armrests for him to sit on. As the woman was cutting his hair, I was glad that we didn't get into the fancy place as Michael was squirming way too much to watch TV, even if one had been there. I had to help her hold his hands down and turn his head so she could get at it. She did a really good job despite Michael protesting as much as possible. At least he didn't scream. Although, there was a lot of whining involved.
Then we went to a nearby park where Michael had a blast with two other little kids, running around everywhere and going down the slides all together in a group. It's great how well he can get along with other kids even when he can't understand a word they're saying. I'm surprised no one got hurt the way they were all hurtling up and down the slides, but we managed to get out of there in one piece.
Since I had saved so much on the haircut (it ended up costing me a little over $5 Cdn, as opposed to the $20 that the "kids" place wanted), I decided to splurge on dinner. We went into a restaurant that turned out to be a steakhouse, although I ordered the fish and the chicken. Normally, I don't eat fish, but Michael had been asking for some, and so I decided to let him try. Of course, I ended up having to eat the whole thing.
What I didn't realize when I went in was that all meals come with the "salad bar" which had garlic toast, a variety of veggies, fountain drinks, fresh fruit, soup, small pieces of cake and four different kinds of ice cream with cones. Our dinners only cost $7 Cdn each, and there's no tipping here, so it turned out to be a really good deal. The steak dinners started at $10 each. The manager kept on encouraging me to go get more food since I had paid for two full meals.
When we ordered, they asked if we wanted black pepper or mushroom sauce on our meat. I said mushroom, even though I wanted black pepper, as I knew Michael wouldn't touch it if it was "too spicy." The mushroom sauce turned out to be BBQ sauce. Whatever. As I rarely eat fish anyways, it wasn't too odd for me to be eating it with BBQ sauce! The meat came out on a sizzling hot plate with some pasta, mixed veggies and a fried egg. Everything here comes with a fried egg.
Michael ate some of his chicken and spent the rest of his meal playing around with his egg. He doesn't like to eat eggs, but he liked "popping" the yolk and making more "sauce" with it. Egg yolk BBQ sauce. When they asked if I wanted it wrapped up to take home, I declined.
I was too full by the end to eat any dessert, but Michael is never too full for ice cream, so we got him a chocolate cone. He's decided that he really likes that restaurant.
No comments:
Post a Comment