Shawshank Museum

S is funny.  Not funny for a kid.  Genuinely funny.  As in, he's some one who is fun to spend time with.

He's funny unintentionally--he has a crush on Giada de Laurentiis.  He has only one giant, cartoonish tooth right now.  He has freckles and mischievous twinkles in his eye.  He looks a little like a modern day Howdy Doody.

Despite his humor, he has some strange obsessions--currently, he's into the sinking of the Titanic and the Holocaust.  Thank God Anne Frank's diary was out from the library.  Maybe truly funny people are also capable of horrible sadness.  I don't know what goes on it that crazy, curly head, but I love it.

Michael continued what awesome Traveling Mom calls the Museum Death March in New York. Not satisfied with seeing every art museum in every city we visited overseas, M found some more in NYC.  And not just kid-friendly museums like the Natural History, but brain-numbing boring to any child under 70 museums like the Met and the Guggenheim.

(Another thing--S constantly refers to the Guggenheim as the Googleheim.  He then absolutely broke down when we found this insanely Googly-eyed guard in the museum.)

The Googleheim is a relatively small museum, exhibit-wise, and S really likes Van Gogh so that was a relatively painless trip.  When S wants you to know he's had enough, there's no ambiguity.  You, and 30 of the closest passers-by will be well aware that he is finished.

Immediately after Googleheim, M decided to push his luck.  I mean REALLY push it, when he led us across 5th Avenue to the Met.  The Met offered us some negotiating (bribery) room.  If the kids gave us one hour in the museum, I would sit with them for 30 minutes in the cafe and then we would go to Armor and Weapons and the Egypt section.  Hold out the stuff they're interested in until the end.  Cross your fingers.

S, who never stopped mocking me for my cane, soon became a big fan.  He sat on my lap (really taking us dangerously close to the cane-seat's 200 pound limit) all through Medieval art (who doesn't need to sit through Medieval art?)  We looked at a jillion gilded triptychs and macabre recreations of the Bible's goriest scenes.  He was quite the trouper.

If you're wondering, E never complains about museums.  Whether he is genuinely interested (I doubt) or just likes to stuff with his dad (which I think is more likely) he just walks on and on.  He loves New York and walks along with us.

Medieval art gave way to 17th and 18th century portraiture.  Yawnsville.  Portraits?

S and I shared commentary on various dead rich white guys.  He pointed out that angels have small penises.  I suggested that maybe Rembrandt was a Hobbit.  We made fun of poofy pants and Elizabethan collars.  Even still, time oozed through molasses.

An hour and a half in, I swooped in and rescued the little men (Ethan, admittedly, did not complain about my liberation) and we went off in search of overpriced refreshments at the museum cafe.  Restored after a three and a half dollar root beer and some smuggled-in protein bars, the boys were soon making jokes about escaping the second half of the museum trip.

S, straight faced as he can be says, "I have a plan.  We tell Dad we need to go to the bathroom."  With perfect timing he holds up a plastic cafe spoon, "and then, we dig."