Zoo Failure and Hot Chocolate

Posted on 2015/11/16 00:19:35 (November 2015).

[Sunday 15th November 2015]
As a combination of having gone to bed very late the night before, and having woken up at 5am (although I did eventually get her back to sleep) Erika slept in until around almost 10 this morning, and Chie even later (not so sure what her excuse was!).

Quite a slobbish remainder of the morning ensued, and I don't think I had a shower and got dressed until pretty much midday.

I'd decided we weren't going to eat out at all today, as Erika hadn't eaten particularly well at either lunch or dinner yesterday. So for lunch I threw together some sort of vaguely Japanese meal of udon, with hakusai, pak choi and a few other things in soup. I arranged the items in Erika's bowl so she had to eat through the greens to get to the noodles, I made it very clear I expected her to do her duty, and kept a close eye on her throughout. That was actually quite successful.

After lunch we returned to our slobbish state, I struggled to think of anything I wanted to do, and the grey unappealing weather wasn't exactly filling any of us with enthusiasm to leave the flat. We had some vague notion of going to John Lewis to buy a rug or somesuch, but that never materialised. Eventually I thought I should at least take Erika to the playground, and she then said she wanted to go the zoo, so without giving much thought to how far we already were through the afternoon, and the impending onset of darkness, we headed in that direction.

We arrived at the zoo at 3:15, only to find last admission at this time of year is at 3 o' clock, as the zoo then closes at 4. I can understand if you're going to pay the full £20 or so entrance fee it's a bit daft to only be there for an hour, but you'd think if you had annual membership as we do you'd be able to get in at any time. Erika would have been quite happy with just 45 minutes there - we could have fit in a go on the carousel and a visit to the penguins. As it was she was very upset, and it's really hard to explain to a 3 year old, who can see through the fence that other people are in the zoo, the concept of a last admission time. I did consider trying to sneak in through one of the service entrances, or bribe the zookeeper at the exit to turn a blind eye, but ultimately convinced myself that dealing with disappointment was an important part of growing up, and was character building, etc.

Instead we went to the playground near the zoo, and by the time we go there she had just about perked up. She had a pretty good play on the slides, swings, roundabout etc, and I felt pleased that she'd got some fresh air and exercise. As often happens when Erika goes to playgrounds, after a while she finds a little corner and calls it her cafe (I think this behaviour harks back to one of our local playgrounds when we were living in Pimlico which had a little table and chair and a serving hatch). Whilst playing the pretend cafe there, the idea of hot chocolate sprang to mind, which seemed perfect for a slightly chilly Autumn day, as it was starting to get dark. So we walked to Camden, found a coffee shop there which served hot chocolate, I ordered two and we sat together in the window drinking them. The staff in the cafe were immediately smitten with Erika ("you're my new favourite customer!"). I don't think Erika has really had hot chocolate much before, and I'd forgotten how nice it can be. This was rather lovely, and the highlight of the day for me.

After that we went into the Whole Foods in Camden, and shopped fairly randomly. Erika picked a lot of odd things off shelves and put them in the basket, but somehow managed to do it in a charming way rather than it being obstructive/bothersome, and again the staff here seemed to find her delightful. We bought some teddy bear shaped pasta which, along with some cannellini beans and cavolo nero formed the basis for our dinner once we got back home, and actually turned out rather well. Erika ate a decent amount as well, which was again very gratifying.

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