Jones' First Visit to Chuck E. Cheese, or, Alan and I Have a Brilliant Idea for a New Website

Our nephew, Jonah, turned five a couple of weeks ago and we went to his birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese.  Jones enjoyed it, but it kind wore me and Alan out - it's been a long time since I've been to a Chuck E. Cheese (since his hostile takeover of Showbiz), and I had really just forgotten how noisy and kind of dirty and just, overall, how overwhelming it is.  Alan made the truest observation:  "Forget 'People of Walmart' - we need to start a website called 'People of Chuck E. Cheese'".  Anyway, again, Jones had a good time, and we did enjoy seeing him taking it all in:

This was his favorite ride - the Bob the Builder front end loader:

We tried to shoot some hoops, but Jones doesn't really like to let go of the ball - he wants to keep it and, maybe, maybe, maybe, if he feels like it, roll it towards you.  He is currently learning to throw, but it's with balls that are much, much smaller than a basketball.

Slide!

Pizza!

The party was Star Wars themed (we got Jonah a Darth Vader light saber - I'm sure Kim and Rick were thrilled by the idea of him running around whacking people and objects with it, and I'm sure they'll reciprocate with their gifts to Jones in a few years ... come to think of it, Alan and I have really been asking for it with our gifts to Jonah; over the years we've been the gifters of the light saber, a scooter, a three wheeler which Jonah used to roll into the kitchen and stand on to get things off of the counter, golf clubs (very handy for whacking people and objects, probably even more so than a light saber), and a drum that I can think of off the top of my head).  The cake was Star-Wars themed and they had "Yoda Soda" to drink - too cute (I don't have any pictures because I was busy wrangling Jones).  These were the light-saber parting gifts (I thought this was so cute, and all of the boys (Alan included) loved them - Jones wanted the entire box!):

Is there anything that screams, "I am an adult with a child and I do adult-with-child activities on the weekend!" more than a trip to Chuck E. Cheese?  I think not.