I love this story. It reminds me of when my sisters and I were kids and Dad let us do stuff Mom would never, ever allow–like eat a whole box of freezer pops.
The thing our dad let us overindulge in was bubble gum. Mom hated gum (smack smack chew smack) and would never let us buy it–not even a pack of Trident for the four of us to share. But when we went to the store with Dad, he’d buy us each a giant pack of Hubba Bubba or Bubble Yum or Bubbalicious, whatever flavor we wanted. And we didn’t have to share.
Of course, one of us would end up with a big wad of gum stuck in our long hair, and Mom would have to get it out with peanut butter and scissors, but it was a small price to pay.
Dads can be so cool.
The other thing he let us do was drink beer and eat peanuts with him on Sundays, even when we were wee tots, but today that would be considered child abuse.
P.S.–Freezer pops are not just for kids. When I was in college, my roommate and I discovered that they were just about the only thing that would fit into the tiny freezer compartment of our dorm refrigerator. We’d eat them while we did our homework. Yum.
but Capybara…“Otter Pops will join Fruit Stripe bubblegum, Kanagroo shoes with the little zip pockets and the Muppet Show in the list of irretreivable things from our past. . .”
Fruitstripe gum is still available! I use it as shutters on my gingerbread houses every year.
When I was little, the only brand of freeze pops available in our area was “Chilly Willee”. I was enrolled in a very small school–about 30 kids per class–so it wasn’t difficult for the teachers or parents to provide enough freeze pops for all of us. I fondly remember the day in first grade when one of my classmates allowed his freezer pop to completely melt, then carefully propped it on the table and slammed his hand onto it.
We didn’t have freeze pops in class anymore after that.