We had plans the day before my dad died to go see Santa. I was going to pick Will up from school then we'd go to the mall and John was going to meet us there, we'd see Santa, have lunch, yadda yadda. That morning I got a call from my dad's hospice nurse that he'd entered the "death stage" and would probably pass in the next 24 to 48 hours. I called my brother after talking to her to see if he thought I should go see our dad that day. We had just been out to see him on Saturday and this was Tuesday. He basically told me that yes I needed to go out there and man up and do it. God bless little brothers! Anyway, I called John and we changed plans to go to the mall by my mom so the boys could still go see Santa. My mom met us there.
I had, of course, taken my camera with me because every other mall I've ever been to lets you take your own pictures of your kids with Santa. I take my own but generally we buy a package anyway...because I'm a sucker like that. We're in line and I see this sign:
In my defense, somewhere other than this sign it said something along the lines of "Please do not take any pictures while in the Santa's Village area" which I took to mean as long as you're outside the little fence area, you're cool to use your own camera. So did the lady in line behind me.
We formulated our plan. John and my mom would take the kids up to Santa, I'd hang back outside the picket fence and take my own pictures. Will was so excited to see Santa and bounded straight up to him when it was their turn. Miles was a bit more hesitant.
You'll notice the elf in the first picture there. I'm still not certain if it was a guy or a girl Perhaps elves are gender neutral? I don't know. Elf saw me taking pictures and our dialog went something like this:
Elf: Ma'am, you can't take your own pictures.
Me: Don't worry, I'll still buy yours.
Elf: That's not the issue, you're not allowed to take your own pictures.
Me (said with defiance and "don't mess with me" tone): What are you going to do, kick me out of the mall?
[Meanwhile I'm still taking pictures]
Elf: No, but I can call mall security.
Me: Go ahead, knock yourself out.
I continued to take pictures until I realized that Miles was not cooperating at all and was pretty freaked out by Santa. Mall security never showed up, so I'm glad I called Elf's bluff. We did end up buying pictures from them, even though I didn't want to out of spite at that point. Our official 2011 Santa picture looked something like this:
Lesson to Elf: don't mess with a girl whose dad has been given two days to live. She really won't care about your stupid camera policy. ;)
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