My two young nieces spent the week w/ me in Charlotte- so I had to change my usual schedule somewhat. They are 9 and 11 and pretty self-sufficient- still they are kids and kids need constant supervision and food and entertainment and stuff. Good Lord! How do these people do it? Having 2-3-4-5 of them at the same time!
I don’t have a T.V. at home which they found incomprehensible beyond all things, I don’t like a/c window units which they found hotter than hell- even though the little angels can’t possibly know or imagine anything about hell- and my dog didn’t particularly like them much which they found really sad and scary since they kept wanting to feed her, pet her and play with her, but were constantly met with guttural growls that scared them silly.
Still all ‘n all they had a good time and wanted to come back this week and once more suffer the vicissitudes I imposed on them simply by their acceptance of my last minute invitation to my work week 250 miles away from my and their homes. They have already planned their next visit.
I had planned to take them on a daily afternoon walk but only made it out one time out of the 4 afternoons they spent here. One of my nieces does not particularly care to walk more than necessary to do the few things she considers absolutely essential. Besides they walked up and down the T.J. Maxx store and the Target store plenty when we went shopping.
One afternoon we made it to Discovery Place here in Charlotte. I discovered nothing; I found the displays lame, boring and irrelevant to anything you’d want a child to learn. Perhaps I am biased because I like Atlanta more than I’ll ever grow to like Charlotte, but I remember Fernbank Museum as being much better, not to mention the other places in Atlanta that actually have live creatures to examine and such. I still have not made it to the Atlanta Aquarium and after viewing the specimens trapped in miserable existence at Discovery Place I doubt I’ll like that place much when I do visit it. Perhaps I read Axolotl one too many times but I found myself trying to make a connection with a Stingray that I swear was looking back at me trying to tell me something: maybe something along the lines of “PLEASE HELP. SEND A RESCUE PARTY. NEED TO GET OUT. NOW.” Just as I was connecting with the Stingray trying to decipher his obvious message thru his confining glass wall a young kid, a volunteer patrolling the place, announced it was time to leave as they were closing shop for the day. I may have to shell out another entry fee in there- maybe next time I can crack the trapped Stingray’s call for help.
We went around the whole place except for the “Rain Forest” display- that display closed early for the “sake of” the animals in there. It was a sad impression of a half-assed rain forest recreation. It could not have looked faker had they tried. I think greasy, highway restaurants with their fake leaves and stuffed birds and plastic animals do a better job at recreating a “natural” space.
I wonder what the parallel universe looks like, the one where unsuspecting humans are just going on about their business when suddenly a huge net descends upon him/her and there goes his/her whole life condemned to existing in wretchedness behind a glass for all to see and forget about a few seconds after walking by.
The funny thing was that the girl’s favorite part of any of the exhibits was a mechanical one put together by Honda I believe. It was a system of pulleys and different stations made to resemble a factory where a bucket of sorts transports beads onto a conveyor belt which then transports the beads to another container which then somehow leads the beads back to the beginning- they spent way too much time on that one and actually had fun.
Towards the back of the aquarium exhibit we found Nemo. I am sad to report that Nemo would have been better off with the devil child with the humongous braces from the movie. Nemo did not look happy- and there’s a picture of him to prove it. Sadly we were unable to capture a picture of Dora- she was camera shy. Good thing she has short term memory loss disorder- she can constantly forget her miserable little blue life in that small crappy tank with the fake coral and fake algae.
The other thing that was worth going there for was the traveling movie exhibit; they had video of actors on make-up chairs with before and after pictures of attractive people being converted into monsters and dead bodies. They also had the models used in several movies; the buildings used for the fictional city in one of the Star Wars movies, a shoe box filled with q-tips being fanned from underneath to simulate a giant stadium filled to capacity with humans and creatures for the same movie. They also had Catwoman’s outfit and other “actual” outfits worn in several other movies. That kept the girls busy for a little while too.
I’ve always thought kids were hard work- I was right. I know-that’s not surprising.
I don’t have a T.V. at home which they found incomprehensible beyond all things, I don’t like a/c window units which they found hotter than hell- even though the little angels can’t possibly know or imagine anything about hell- and my dog didn’t particularly like them much which they found really sad and scary since they kept wanting to feed her, pet her and play with her, but were constantly met with guttural growls that scared them silly.
Still all ‘n all they had a good time and wanted to come back this week and once more suffer the vicissitudes I imposed on them simply by their acceptance of my last minute invitation to my work week 250 miles away from my and their homes. They have already planned their next visit.
I had planned to take them on a daily afternoon walk but only made it out one time out of the 4 afternoons they spent here. One of my nieces does not particularly care to walk more than necessary to do the few things she considers absolutely essential. Besides they walked up and down the T.J. Maxx store and the Target store plenty when we went shopping.
One afternoon we made it to Discovery Place here in Charlotte. I discovered nothing; I found the displays lame, boring and irrelevant to anything you’d want a child to learn. Perhaps I am biased because I like Atlanta more than I’ll ever grow to like Charlotte, but I remember Fernbank Museum as being much better, not to mention the other places in Atlanta that actually have live creatures to examine and such. I still have not made it to the Atlanta Aquarium and after viewing the specimens trapped in miserable existence at Discovery Place I doubt I’ll like that place much when I do visit it. Perhaps I read Axolotl one too many times but I found myself trying to make a connection with a Stingray that I swear was looking back at me trying to tell me something: maybe something along the lines of “PLEASE HELP. SEND A RESCUE PARTY. NEED TO GET OUT. NOW.” Just as I was connecting with the Stingray trying to decipher his obvious message thru his confining glass wall a young kid, a volunteer patrolling the place, announced it was time to leave as they were closing shop for the day. I may have to shell out another entry fee in there- maybe next time I can crack the trapped Stingray’s call for help.
We went around the whole place except for the “Rain Forest” display- that display closed early for the “sake of” the animals in there. It was a sad impression of a half-assed rain forest recreation. It could not have looked faker had they tried. I think greasy, highway restaurants with their fake leaves and stuffed birds and plastic animals do a better job at recreating a “natural” space.
I wonder what the parallel universe looks like, the one where unsuspecting humans are just going on about their business when suddenly a huge net descends upon him/her and there goes his/her whole life condemned to existing in wretchedness behind a glass for all to see and forget about a few seconds after walking by.
The funny thing was that the girl’s favorite part of any of the exhibits was a mechanical one put together by Honda I believe. It was a system of pulleys and different stations made to resemble a factory where a bucket of sorts transports beads onto a conveyor belt which then transports the beads to another container which then somehow leads the beads back to the beginning- they spent way too much time on that one and actually had fun.
Towards the back of the aquarium exhibit we found Nemo. I am sad to report that Nemo would have been better off with the devil child with the humongous braces from the movie. Nemo did not look happy- and there’s a picture of him to prove it. Sadly we were unable to capture a picture of Dora- she was camera shy. Good thing she has short term memory loss disorder- she can constantly forget her miserable little blue life in that small crappy tank with the fake coral and fake algae.
The other thing that was worth going there for was the traveling movie exhibit; they had video of actors on make-up chairs with before and after pictures of attractive people being converted into monsters and dead bodies. They also had the models used in several movies; the buildings used for the fictional city in one of the Star Wars movies, a shoe box filled with q-tips being fanned from underneath to simulate a giant stadium filled to capacity with humans and creatures for the same movie. They also had Catwoman’s outfit and other “actual” outfits worn in several other movies. That kept the girls busy for a little while too.
I’ve always thought kids were hard work- I was right. I know-that’s not surprising.
