On Street Fairs, Weather, and Bad Parenting

There are certain days when I wish I wrote a food blog.  Like today, when my stomach is full of delicious Richmond Greek Festival moussaka and duck fat french fries from a place called Rox, who had a booth at a street festival called Broad Appetit.

But the fact is that I don't run a food blog, and even if I did, that's still probably not what I would be talking about today.

Because, well, I need to rant.

This was not a place for your infants or pets.  It was 90 degrees today in Richmond (which is, admittedly, not all that unusual) and is, honestly, perfectly fine weather for a street food festival.  It is not, however, fine for babies and dogs.  The National Weather Service points to any temperature above 82 degrees with high humidity as a reason to use extreme caution for risks of heat stroke, dehydration, or hyperthermia.*  These risks are significantly greater for children and the elderly.  Also, I'm sure your poodle in full winter coat isn't appreciating it either (although, shoutout to the SPCA for having an air-conditioned RV and water for all the dogs who were out there in this heat anyway).

I also don't know where people get the idea that large crowds, particularly large crowds where people will be drinking, are a good atmosphere for a small child or pet.  They could get tripped on, spilled on, or in any way hurt extraordinarily easily in those kinds of situations, and aside from that, it's incredibly overstimulating.  Your child is not appreciating the street food and craft beers that you are currently purchasing beer tickets for.  As a matter of fact, he's red in the face and on the verge of unconsciousness and I'm pretty sure you should go find a doctor.

Hire a babysitter.  Leave the dog at home with water and air conditioning.  You're not doing anyone a favor by bringing them to events like these.

Yours in frustration,
Rachel Leigh

*http://www.nws.noaa.gov/os/heat/index.shtml#wwa

On Little Kids and Amusement Parks

This is less a Dane-centric post and more one of my traditional rants inspired by something I noticed.

Yesterday I went to LEGOLAND in Billund, Denmark, which is about three and a half/four hours from Copenhagen.  It was a) totally awesome and b) full of small children, because that is what amusement parks generally are.

Which led me to notice how many of these small children looked absolutely miserable.  Which got me thinking -- How much of "children loving amusement parks" is really their parents WANTING them to love amusement parks?  I'm sorry, but your two year old doesn't want to be here.  Your two year old is too small to ride most of the rides, is probably overwhelmed and distressed by the number of strangers, and would probably rather be taking a nap than coming to Legoland where they cannot eat or poop on anything, which, from what I gather, are babies' favorite pastimes.

I always had a love-hate relationship with amusement parks, especially when I was younger.  As much as I love the lights and sounds and games and park food, I was always really terrified of most park rides which meant that I was stuck either going on rides that scared me (and crying because I was miserable) or waiting for everyone else to go on them (and being bored).  As much as I did genuinely enjoy going to amusement parks, there were parts that sucked, parts that I couldn't really vocalize the suckage of until I was much older.

So take your kids to amusement parks when they're seven and can tell you whether or not they really like it.  Don't drag them there when they're too little to have any fun or to tell you that they're not.

Yours exhaustedly after a long day at Legoland,
Rachel Leigh