So we've just returned from most excellent trip to Disney World, in which I am fairly sure it is impossible to be melancholy, or even slightly less than super happy. They make it so.
Is magic.
However, in case you want to throw some horrifying, inappropriate, half-remembered Meryl Streep-doing-an-accent in with the Fun, just invite me along.
I can wreak havoc anywhere, it appears.
Even on It's A Small World.
At Disney World.
Happy animatronic poppets singing about unity and world peace?
Or, "The dingo ate my baby!!!"
Backstory:
I am on It's A Small World boat, sitting next to E, known Information-Seeker and Exposer of My Misdeeds.
Matt and the other two are safely seated behind us, watching the happy robot children sing.
We all love the Small World ride and go on it repeatedly when at Disney, since it is both insane and awesome, two of our favorite things.
This particular Small World scandale went down on our first night of vacation, so maybe I was tired.
Punchy.
Something.
Anyway, as our boat of Happy takes us into Australia and such, E asks me what kind of dog is next to the boy with the boomerang.
It's a dingo, of course.
I know this, thanks to Meryl Streep.
That's all I know, since I apparently did NOT know how to keep my big mouth shut and tell my 10 year old that the dog was a lab mix. I instead mush on with the following awful conversation:
Horrible True Crimes Committed By Dingoes And Society, By Mommy.
The extent of my dingo knowledge is "The Dingo Ate My Baby" movie, the one where Meryl Streep wears horrible black bowl cut wig, does a very good Australian accent, and plays tormented mother of aforementioned baby.
And because I am an idiot, I choose to try to explain the true story dingo-baby movie to E, who immediately is like "What? That dog ate a lady's baby?"
And then I decide it is important to clarify, by saying that the dingo was a wild dog that was not as cute as that robot one, and that the mother of the baby was falsely accused of infanticide, partly because she did not cry enough, she seemed mad and grumpy and not sad and weepy, and people chose to believe she was bad and had killed her own baby. . .
And then I realize, I am a total, complete moron digging giant hole for myself, and I cannot wriggle out of this conversation, being held while Happy Robots From All Over The Small World sing.
I can ruin anything.
And I try to explain to E what I took away from the movie/true story, other than "the dingo ate my baby" pop culture reference, was how first impressions sometimes are ruinous, and the justice system did not work in this case and after a number of years the lady was proven right, and set free, . . . but it is not a happy story, at ALL.
And we are at Disney World, where the happy is just raining down on us, unless I choose to put up an Umbrella Of Awful.
Which I totally did.
Big Giant Umbrella Of Ruining The Fun, Thanks Mom, Now I Will Have Nightmares.
And E is indignant, wants to know did everything turn out OK? She wants to know did they just unlock the jail and say, "Sorry" to the lady when they found out the dingo did eat the baby, and also why did the dingo eat the baby, and also why was I watching a movie about this?
And I am all, "E look, we're in Holland, there are ducks!"
And she is all, "Not buying it. Tell me more about the horrible terrible story involving babies and dingos and grumpy mothers in jail."
And I am all, "I am very glad that family in front of us cannot hear me right now, or I'd get us thrown out of the Happiest Place On Earth."
But E and I did have a cool talk about not making snap judgments about people based on how you think they should act (She tried to get in a "Sometimes a temper tantrum is OK" here, but I blocked that one, am not total amateur), about how sometimes what seems like the right answer is not right, and how we are never going camping in Australia.
And as we depart the ride, I turn to Matt and am all "Could you hear what we were talking about?"
And he is all, "Nooo?"
And E is all, "Dad, do you know what a dingo is?"
And I am all, "Who wants to go to the tea cups????"
And luckily, tea cup ride is another tradition, in which Matt takes progressively funnier photos of the girls as the tea cups whirl around, and one ride's disaster is dodged as we rush off to take embarrassing pictures of each other.
Fairly benign snarky silliness, no scary true-life crime stories at ALL.
Did not even talk about the Boston Tea Party, or even complain about no Starbucks at Disney.
(Which? Honestly, that seems like a win-win to me, seriously.)
Dodged a cloning debate when we got to renovated Fantasyland and there are now two Dumbo rides instead of one. Exact same, just two, and I almost started a whole thing.
But I did not!!!
Hurray! I remembered to STOP TALKING!
Is magical place, after all.
