Germs-Fast Food Playgrounds

This is GERM-week post #3.  Read #1 here and #2 here.  Then go take a shower!  The following stories are not about Lilly Katherine.  They are about Preston, but I couldn’t leave them out.

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Indoor Fast Food Playgrounds. I am confident that there is no nastier, germier place on earth!  You open the door to the playground and you are instantly knocked in the face with a puff of very distinct smells…feet, sweat, and urine.

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Who decided that fast food playgrounds needed to be indoors?  Outside playgrounds are so much better.  Kids can get their vitamin D from the sun, germs aren’t trapped and harvested in a petri-dish atmosphere, rain washes all the kooties away, the kids can scream and not disturb the entire restaurant, there’s no going IN and OUT of the playground door, there’s no running through the restaurant with bare feet.

I guess I’m not a very cool mom, but i absolutely loathe these stinkin’ indoor playgrounds, and I know I’m not alone…though I may be in the minority.

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Here are two personal reasons why…

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STORY #1:

When Preston was almost 2 we met a group of friends at McDonald’s.  My sweet friend (who is the antithesis of me when it comes to germs) was there with her 2 kids, and potty training her youngest.  At one point, an older boy came down the slide and said, “Some kid peed in the slide.”  My friend went into the slide, (it wasn’t too far inside) and she cleaned it with a wipe.  That’s when I realized that this was probably not an isolated incident.  I couldn’t imagine what went on inside that opaque plastic oversized hamster tubing.

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We were having a lovely time until Preston decided he wanted to follow his friends up to the tallest tube…which led to the highest slide.  Preston got to the top and WOULD NOT come down.  He froze.  I could hear him crying, calling for me.  All the moms looked at me as if to say, “So, now what are you going to do?”

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I sat.

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I waited.

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I thought, SURELY this kid is going to come down!  It’s just a slide.

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No kid.  Just crying…screaming.

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I was left with no choice.  I had to go where no man had gone before.  Okay, I had to go where no germ-a-phobe freak had gone before.  I had to climb to the tip top of that HORRIBLE oversized hamster tube.

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Let me tell you something.  If you think it looks nasty from the window…If you think it looks nasty when you’re taking your kid from the bottom of the slide…If you think it smells like feet when you walk in the door…

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YOU NEED TO GO TO THE TIP TOP OF THAT HORRID PLACE!

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It was breathtaking, and I don’t mean in a good way.  I mean in a Seinfeld kind of way.

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There were stains from who knows what up there.  There were pieces missing that shouldn’t have been.  There was sticky, smelly stuff slathered on every surface.  It was at least 30 degrees warmer in there and SO HUMID.  The air was thick and felt like sweat…little kid, puppy dog smelling sweat.

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I climbed up as quickly as I could, grabbed my fearful little one, told him he couldn’t go in another hamster tube til he was 12, and slid down the twisty, twirly slide trying not to touch ANYTHING else!

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My friends were all laughing.  They said, “I bet you take a shower when you get home!”  My response was, “Ladies, I’m heading there RIGHT NOW!”

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STORY #2:

Preston was not an easy potty trainer (to say the absolute least!)  One day we were at Chick-fil-A with friends and P was in the playground (I guess I didn’t learn my lesson the first time).  I went to get him and when I opened the door, my child was standing BAREFOOT in a HUGE puddle of yellow liquid.

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I was NOT happy!

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I looked at him and started fussing, “Preston, why did you tee-tee on yourself!  I can’t believe you did this!  I had just asked you if you needed to go!”

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Just then a precious friend that knows what a germ-a-phobe I am said, “I was trying to move him before you saw him.  It’s not his.”

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What?!?!

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“Preston didn’t have an accident.  Someone else did, and Preston is just standing in it.”

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LOVELY!

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After I gagged, I yanked my child from the puddle of someone else’s pee and we went straight to the bathroom.  I bathed that child as well as I could in the little restaurant sink, then we went home to sanitize from head to TOE!

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