Ariance and Me.

‘Moms’ unlike jobs, everyone has one, or had one. Good or bad, you could not have arrived here otherwise. Even Jesus had a mother and although she was all Gucci and such and didn’t get pregnant by the conventional wet, sticky and messy method that we all indulge in so feverishly she still had to change a few nappies in her time.

My point being: Some moms are great and wise and some not. While some bathed their children in love and kindness others would believe that kids just came about from nothing more than a serious bout of bloating.

I think we will talk about the latter.

So, here I am about to order a cup of frozen yogurt at our local Penguin’s Frozen Yogurt Emporium and in comes two women, one apparently a mom with her two-year-old kid. Two-years old being a generous guess on my behalf. And the kid from what I could figure out… had a vocabulary of three words: "wah’, ‘gawgoogi’ and ‘that-that’… That-that being the predominant word of choice. So of course mommy does the frozen yogurt order:

Mommy: Ariance, what would you like honey?

Ariance: Pointing… "That-that"

Mommy to attendant: Ok, Ariance would like a small cup of double fudge cappuccino frozen yogurt.

Attendant: Would you like a topping with that?

Note: Topping – singular.

Mommy: Yes, rainbow sprinkles, M & M’s, gummy bears and a spoon of Fruit Loops, oh are those Oreo crumbs? Dust the top with Oreo crumbs please.

This all on a four-ounce cup of caffeine laden yogurt. Whereas upon receiving the sub-zero sugar delight –which by the way from by vantage point looked the color of a dead rodent - mom begins spooning the cold treasure into the child’s mouth and all the while moaning for the benefit of all still in line… yummmmmmm.

I guess she was hoping to sugar up the kid into increasing its vocabulary by diner time.

AND

That my friend by all manor or measure, simply put, is child abuse… is it any wonder that being 12 today is the new 22?

Hell, back when I was a kid we didn’t have toppings in fact, we didn’t even have frozen yogurt. We had Foster Freeze: A soft serve cone dipped into a batch of hot fudge that hardened into a protective intimidating chocolaty shell. Which basically meant you had to create an entry point into the barrier in order to suck out the ice cream. There was no licking a Foster Freeze chocolate dipped cone. And once inside, you could only mine the distance of your tongue. Or for a backup option you could always root around with your finger but this required turning the cone sideways and more than not the entire cream crammed shell would end up in your lap or worse… on the ground. Which automatically locked in the three-minute rule that ‘ahem’ doesn’t necessarily work well with ice cream or other items that go "splat’ when landing.

And unlike Penguin’s Frozen Yogurt Emporium it was not every week that we were treated to Foster Freeze. No, that was when we were "Good" Good meaning, none of us kids were injured in an early evening rock fight that week, didn’t fall from the top level of the monkey bars at school and break a bone or worse yet, break someone else’s bone. Didn’t take the wrong bus home from school or while heating a tortilla on the stove didn’t mistakenly turn the burner up on the pressure cooker. Did not lie when blood or sharp objects were involved in any given situation. Did not practice Three Stooges social techniques on younger siblings. Drank from the water hose instead of coming into the house for a glass of water when Uncle Louie came for an afternoon visit.

That was being good and being good of course meant, ice cream and ice cream was so much more fun than rabbit hunting.

And that boys and girls will be our topic for tomorrow.

Note: Foster Freeze is still around today but the chocolate they use for dipping is of a soft nature that blends into the soft-serve as you eat it. Like polio good soft-serve protective chocolate is a thing of the past. What a shame.

School photo of yours truly taken sometime in the late 50's - yeah, yeah, I know.

Comments

[Sasha]

There was a Foster Freeze near my house while I was growing up that gave free ice cream cones away on Halloween. Unfortunately they knocked down the Foster Freeze and it became a 7-11. But there was another Foster Freeze not too far from the house that stayed open for a long time even in the midst of several Chinese supermarkets, etc, opening up around it. The Foster Freeze eventually got kind of ghetto and closed down. Oh yeah, and speaking of Ariance and her mother's ilk, we recently saw a mom buying her young daughters caffeine laden sugar-filled blended coffee drinks -before school- one morning when we stopped at the local bakery. We see that kind of crap all the time and it amazes me. Thankgod I grew up with a good Mexican mom who believed in deprivation and tough love. In the olden days we were lucky if we got a little rubber mat under our metal monkey bars and the free ice cream cone on Halloween. These days you just sit the kids in front of a tv and give them sugar and caffeine every day of their lives.

[Alvin]

Thanks for commenting Sasha, yeah, they are fading out here as well, we have one on Glenoaks in Burbank but they are not really the same. Like A&W Root Beer stands they have been subject to the almighty dollar and everything on the menu is frozen or thawing.

Yeah, I remember when the rubber mats came into play... that meant you got one good bounce before the hurt set in. ;-)

[Alice]

We didn't have any place to get ice cream with chocolate shells where I grew up. Heck I remember my mother making ice cream in an old hand crank ice cream maker and crunching up peppermint candy to put in it. I guess chocolate was forbidden in my house or we just didn't have it. I do recall flavor straws that were coated with some chocolate substitute but never really where chocolate.

[Carol]

We have and always have had Dairy Queens, I loved the chocolate covered cones. I am not a big ice cream fan though. My grandson isn't allowed caffine drinks and not much sugar. But once in a great while he is allowed to have a small French vanilla cap. He likes the flavor. But he doesn't get to to have one often. He mostly drinks juice and milk.
Cute photo of you.

[Tim]

This is a great read.
I grew up in the late 60's / early 70's in rural parts, and I remember some of those rock fights we had! For us, "being good" meant vanishing for hours at a time into the fields or bushes and returning in time to get our chores done, without touching any of my dad's tools or possessions. You had to make sure you didn't hurt your little brothers too bad or leave anyone behind, or let anyone run home crying. Suffice it to say, there were many times we didn't get any 'you were good 'rewards!
I understand your viewpoint on "caffeine laden" snacks and drinks. I watch children enjoying several 'iced caps' a week. None of these children mine, by the way. When my children have been 'good' I take them to get regular old hard ice cream with a dipped wafer cone and two scoops, and we sit by the riverbank at the old time grocery store in the country and enjoy nature. And this happens about once a month in the summer. In the winter, we go out for hot chocolate and a donut and sit indoors at the coffee shop.

[Stephanie]

I liked the cherry dips over the chocolate. I also enjoyed practicing Three Stooges social techniques on younger siblings.

[Alvin]

Alice: Wow, Alice, Yes, I do remember the chocolate straws. They were a regular in our house as well. I can't ever recall anyone in our household hand cranking out ice cream but I do recall shaking a big tub of straight cream (we lived on a dairy for a while) until it would have the consistency of whipped butter. That was just so cruel... it takes forever for that miracle to happen and at least four kids to shake the damn thing.

Carol: Ah yes DQ's we had / have them in the northern part of the state, I think it was my second honeymoon, traveling up the state we would hit quite a few of the DQ's on the way to Washington and grab what they called DQ Blizzards. Sex and malted milkshakes... the two requirements of a happy man.

Tim: Yeah, I love the riverbank/grocery store thing, that makes for some quality kid time. Can't beat it. I think one of the best times ever I had with my kids was the coffee shop thing, cherry pie and coco. In fact, my son and I still do that from time to time, some things are just meant to last forever.

Stephanie: Three Stooge skills are to be passed down from generation to generation just like a good broach. Gotta love the boys.

=alvin=

[JD at I Do Things]

I've never heard of Foster Freeze, but, like Carole, we had Dairy Queens. That was a HUGE treat: driving with dad to get 4 chocolate-dipped cones and praying they wouldn't all drip away before we got home. I want one. NOW!

[JD at I Do Things]

I've never heard of Foster Freeze, but, like Carole, we had Dairy Queens. That was a HUGE treat: driving with dad to get 4 chocolate-dipped cones and praying they wouldn't all drip away before we got home. I want one. NOW!

[Alice]

Alvin I make ice cream with my kids at school using the shake the cream method... they love it. It may not be Ben and Jerry's or Blue Bell, but they made it themselves. That is what makes it taste good.

[Alvin]

JD: Thanks for stopping in JD. Yeah, ya can't beat DQ even today. They Rock.

Alice: Yeah. Ben and Jerry's is a little overrated I think. I mean... it really doesn't make me want to run out and buy a pint of Chubby Hubby. Oh well. Yeah. homemade ice cream must rock... never had any, will have to put that on my Bucket List. Thanks for stopping in.