Man Down!

What I learned on Father’s day was that the things that you teach your children will, invariably, come back to haunt you. Most likely in a public place with lots and lots of people.

For Father’s day this year we decided to take Little Hoss (2 1/2 ) and Bubba Hoss (9 months) to see Kung Fu Panda. Yes, we are those people that you hate that bring an infant to a movie. Go ahead and judge, I am impervious to your criticism even though I have given this same bitch myself numerous times.

But in my defense, this was a kids movie so you should expect some kids screaming.

I chose this time to take my daughter to her first movie because over the last several weeks we have been doing “Cartoon Night” at the Hossman household. We gather the kids up on Sat. night, pop in a cartoon movie or something that is on TV and let the kids stay up late while we have a great time. Hossmom prepares some special movie time desert and Little Hoss gets to stay up an extra 2 hours past bedtime. She freaking loves it and I pat myself on the back for being a great dad.

She does great in this environment and usually watches close to the whole movie before she falls asleep or goes apeshit. So we decided that for Father’s day we would take her to Kung Fu Panda. She has seen the preview and for the last week thinks that everything with fur on it is a Panda, including me. I am Daddy Panda.

We pack up and head off to the 11:30 showing. A friend advised us to “shovel” food at Little Hoss during the movie so she would stay seated. In hindsight, this did not mean give her everything at once.

As a family we get popcorn, a couple of Sprits, Skittles and Little Hoss boosts a bag of Reeces Pieces because she is a little thief as well.

We head to our seats and hunker down, hoping perhaps that we can make it through 90 minutes of cartoon greatness.

Little Hoss sat on my lap so I could keep an eye on her, atleast that was what was in my mind. I’m sure that what was in hers was that I would be a good placemat and cup holder.

I swear to you, I have never seen a kid begin to gorge themselves so quickly. Little Hoss doesn’t get a lot of sugar and candy but once she had a taste of the sweet dragon, she couldn’t get off.

We weren’t even through the previews when the Reeces, Skittles and popcorn are all on her lap. She’s got the Sprite in her little monkey kunfu grip and is chugging like she is at a college keeger. She’s only had soda a couple of times in her life and this is a rare treat and she resists any attempts to let go.

In between gulps of soda she is putting handfuls of candy in her mouth. Reeces are mixed with Skittles, popcorn is flying past her head to the rows besides us, complete and total carnage. You would have thought that we never feed her.

And she would get pissed if good old Dad tried to get a little for himself. She would actually scream “No! Mine!” and pull away. Finally we were able to pull most of it away except the Reeces Pieces. My kid would never share with ET, fuck him. But we got it all away and then the fun really started.

One of the last previews was for a football movie. Now she has watched a lot of football with good old dad. So what does she yell when she sees sports on a gigantic TV? “Touchdown! Touchdown! Touchdown!” I have never seen a kid go from normal to sugar rush in less than five minutes but good Christ. And yes, it was a full theater.

She throws her hands in the air and continues to yell “Touchdown!” I’m trying to restrain her but she just has to throw those little monkey arms in the air like Touchdown Jesus and yell.

Now the movie starts and this is where everything that I have taught her comes to bite me in the ass.

The movie has numerous animals in it, which seems appropriate since it is about a Panda who learns Kung fu. You may already know this as you have probably seen the previews but my daughter does not think so. She now explodes into identifying every single animal that appears on the screen. One part of me is extremely proud that our many trips to the zoo have paid off. The other part was horrified when she yelled “Daddy, Tiger! Daddy, Snake! Daddy, Goose! Honk Honk!” By the way, all birds she sees right now are geese that go Honk Honk!

And she doesn’t stop until you acknowledge that yes honey, daddy sees the tiger. I quickly clamp my hand over her mouth but this makes no difference what so ever which makes me extremely pissed at the movies where that works. I mean, my kid wasn’t even phased that I was clamping down. She kept on screaming “Tiger! Tiger! Tiger!”

Finally we got her to calm down. I think that the worst is over but I am wrong. You see, I have taught my daughter one other thing that I thought was funny and more useful than yelling Touchdown, although I do love that.

You see, Bubba Hoss can sit up on his own right now but on occasion he does fall down. When he does, I taught my daughter to yell “Medic! Medic! Man Down!” Then we throw our hands into the air and run around before picking up my son. It’s very funny and when I’m not in the room it’s like an early warning system when my son goes crashing.

Again, not a good thing in a moive where the lead character is a clumsy Panda. Within 10 minutes of the movie actually starting, the Panda falls down. Immediately, Little Hoss jumps out of my lap, the hands go in the air, and she screams “Medic, Man Down!” at the top of her lungs while running up and down the aisle.

We made it a good 30 minutes into the movie before we decided that the people around us had had enough. At 2 ½ it doesn’t look like she is ready to see a movie in a theater and we will stick to the Sat. night movie bonanza at the Hossman household.

But come on, “Medic, Man Down!” That’s funny.