The one where they didn't have any cheese
Last week we got caught in the classic parent trap, where we ran out of arms, legs, and time. While I finished my work in the study (working from home that day), my other half was busy crashing around in the kitchen making dinner when I heard the fateful shout;“oh Poo!“I dropped what I was doing and wandered in to see what had happened.“I'm making cauliflower cheese for dinner, everything else is ready, and I've just discovered we have no cheese!“Given that I couldn't get out of my work commitments (a distant office was waiting on the work I was doing), and the kids had to leave the house fairly promptly for Brownies after dinner, there was no option. We were going to have to send Miss 9 to the shop.
I fished some coins from the penny jar. Far more than she would need.“Can you go and get some cheese from the corner shop?it's on the right hand side as you walk inabove the milk”.
She nodded, and wandered off up the drive, and across the green in front of our house, hair bobbing in the breeze. I got on with my work, and eventually reached a good end point for the day and realised Miss 9 hadn't returned.“I'll go and find her”So I set off across the green, retracing her steps. I half expected to see her turn each corner I approached, and grew increasingly concerned as she failed to appear in front of me. Finally as I rounded he last corner, there she waswalking at quite a clip along the pavement towards me with a rather large bag of stuff in her hand. She waved happily as she approached.“Did you get the cheese?”“Yes”“What else did you get then?” (I peered into the bag)“Bread, milk, butter, and a chocolate bar for everybody but where's the cheese?”“I couldn't find it”“So you spent all the money on all of this, but didn't get the one thing we sent you to get?“She suddenly realised the enormity of what she had done, and turned very pale.“Sorry Dad”I had one of those awful parenting moments, where I didn't want to squash her first trip to the shop on her own, and was actually quite tickled that she had taken it upon herself to turn the trip into a solo shopping expedition.“It doesn't matter”.
That was just about the moment I realised I had no money in my pocket, we still had no cheese, and dinner was still waiting for us.
I walked her home, grabbed my wallet, and flew straight out of the house while my other half cuddled her head in the middle of the kitchen, saying “Oh, it doesn't matter”.
Miraculously, when I arrived at the shop a few minutes later, the shelf was full of cheese, right above the milk where I had described. Dinner was only a few minutes late, and the Brownie Leader arrived on time.