What I did on my weekend vacation Part 2...

My mother and I have always played this little game. We go shopping together. I pick out some clothes or an appliance or something stupid and use my best infomercial reasoning of why one would need such a thing. She plays the part of the doubting consumer. As an example, here is a little play:

ME: Look at this corkscrew! Isn't this the greatest corkscrew you've ever seen? Read the box! You screw it into a cork and it pulls the cork out for you. You'll never have to use a dangerous knife when opening wine again!

MOMMY: Displaying a suspiscious don't-even-ask-me-to-buy-that-for-you look on her face: Looks like any other corkscrew to me. I hope you have enough money to pay for it yourself.

ME: Placing the item in our shopping cart: I just might buy it for myself then.

They arrive at the register.

ME: $50 does seem like a lot of money for a corkscrew. You're right I can't really afford it. Even though I really need one. Exagerates a sad sigh face, which can hardly be contained behind a smile.

Both know what's going on and both know how this is going to end.

ME: Speaking absurdly to rouse fake guilt: I cut myself 3 times trying to get into a bottle of Pinot Grigio last week.

Mommy half-smiles and places corkscrew on the checkout counter. She secretly loves it.

This was the same game I intended to play in order to earn my Shark Cordless Sweeper with an intelligent swivel head and patented wall-hugging technology. It's not hard to get my mom to dance this dance.

Rule #1: Get her in the shopping mood. Spend an afternoon of shopping with her before the purchase, which I would probably do anyway.

Rule #2: Play your hand close to your chest. I don't want to reveal my ultimate plan too soon. The key is to drop small hints into coversation throughout the day. "Yeah, the floors in my apartment are so difficult to clean," and "So I saw Raelyn last night. Ya know what she did at her surprise party, that crazy girl! It was so funny..." Sounds easy, but it takes a lifetime of practice to make sure it doesn't seem forced.

Rule #3: Make it convenient stop. We went to Barnes and Noble Booksellers to pick up a few books, to the mall to return a watch and browse, and headed home. No Target in the vacinity. I would have to draw her to it. I suggested a movie at the theater right next to the local Target.

My Dad came with us to see Hide and Seek starring creepy little Dakota Fanning and creepy old Robert DeNiro. For anyone out there who doesn't know who Charlie is, it really isn't worth finding out. The reveal is so boring and cheats so much, one can only be disappointed. Why didn't Dakota Fanning just tell her father who it was? If I ever have a daughter as creepy and secretive as this girl, she better look out. When supernatural-seeming things happen around children, you have to just smack them around a little and be done with it. Think of all the suffereing and havoc that could have been avoided if the adults in such movies as Poltergeist or The Exorcist would have just given those little girls a good crack in the mouth and told them "Just knock this crap off."

I tried my best to learn my lesson from The Wedding Date fiasco and sat far enough away from everyone else as possible. This plan does not prevent other people of terrible hygene from sitting next to you. A family of 5 sat in the seats next to me, and I didn't have the heart to tell the heavyset grandfather that I was saving the seat for someone, though all my senses were telling me to lie. He sat down and immediately started complaining to his daughter and her 5 year-old son (who brings an impressionable 5 year-old to see a bloody thriller, especially one starring a ill-behaved Dakota Fanning?) that the oversized seats in which we sat were too small and uncomfortable.

It was not my weekend for breathing in movie theaters because as soon as he settled down the scent of my large wheezing neighbor's leather ball-cap began to mingle with his considerable B.O. and drift my way. To top it off he whipped out a hotdog. "With all the fixin's," he remarked to his wife. Have you ever smelled the combination of the leather, the non-kosher hotdog, fixin's, and man-sweat? My parents chuckled at me the whole movie. Perhaps Mommy would feel sympathy for my plight and bestow upon me a Shark Cordless Sweeper with an intelligent swivel head and patented wall-hugging technology. With my father driving home, there was no way we were stopping at Target tonight. I would have to wait till morning.