Afternoon Well Spent

It was MLK day today. Martin Luther King day. It's a momentous day in the history of the United States. These days, it's a day where all schools, government offices and banks remain closed but my work is not! Miss Haana's school was off so I had scheduled to take the afternoon off from work.

The plan was for Dad to hang out at home till noon. Little Miss Haana and I had discussed the plan the previous day- I will come home from work and we'll go for lunch. After lunch, we were to go on a  very important mission- we had to get chocolate ice cream with sprinkles! We had giggled when we conspired about it the previous day and vowed not to tell Papa (he had already heard!).

So here I was; back at home a little after noon. We headed out for lunch shortly after. The little girl whispered urgently what she wanted to eat -porotta ( a wheat bread made into layers; available exclusively at South Indian restaurants). She also reminded me of which restaurant to go to, since the one I thought of was closed on Mondays. Both of us reached our choicest restaurant, eagerly ordered our entrees (some of us needed no Menus). After finishing but before leaving the restaurant, I took a fist full of their candy- the colorful sugar coated fennel! We split it between us and ate it in mouthfuls of "so tasty" comments! 

My next stop was the library. I had been threatened into returning all the books we had issued last time (the library sends multiple reminder emails if the books are due) and I wanted to get us a new stock. We quickly moved through our kids' area and selected choicest 20-25 books. Both of us held a big pile of books and headed back for the car. 

Our next stop was this place we had just discovered last week. Last weekend on Ayaana's birthday party, we had discovered this new trampoline place closeby. With several trampolines, dogdgeball areas, a rock climbing wall, a foam pit! There was tons of stuff. Both of us jumped and tumbled. I tried the rock climbing wall. We tumbled in the foam pit! The little girl tried several of her gymnastics moves. We were having a blast till I realized we had been there for over an hour and both of us were thirsty. We got some water and headed out. I may have used the word "ice" and "cream" in the same sentence in order to lure the little girl out of the trampoline place!

But I got what I deserved, because the entire way back, all I heard from the back seat was varying specifics of the kind, type, color and temperature of the ice cream  Also, that it needs to be in a cone.

While driving back towards home, we came up to a Sonic. I offered to stop there. The little girl refused. While Sonic ice cream were good, today was not their day. (She said we'll come back there on Sunday and have a Sonic ice cream.  I said we'll see about that!). No, today was not a day for McDonalds' ice cream either. We had to get ours' today from the store with the pink ice cream cone! Unfortunately, I knew exactly what that meant! Marble Slab Cremery.

I dutifully drove to our already chosen destination. We both got our selections and ate with mouthfuls of delight. And as the evening set it, we headed back home with the glow of warm contentment only chocolate ice cream with sprinkles can afford!!