Valentines Day

I know, last week. But we've never been real big on celebrating Valentines Day so I have been ignoring this post for busy reasons. Well, I guess we did celebrate the one Valentines in 2008 because Owen was born in November '08, but that was it. My big romantic plan this year was to do nothing except a card and a bag of chocolate like I usually do. Why do I need to spend a ton of $$$ on something when I should really be showing the wife love the other 365 days of the year? Then I saw the flyer for Sweetheart Night at the local Chick-fil-A on the 13th. Yes! Sign us up immediately.

We love Chick-fil-A, probably more so than the average family. Since the wife is allergic to gluten (wheat, malt, barely), she can't eat at very many restaurants. Even if the restaurant understands what gluten is, there's often cross contamination issues like preparing her food on a surface that just had bread crumbs on it or running their french fries through the same fryer they just did the breaded chicken nuggets. Chick-fil-A on the other hand, uses a dedicated fryer for their delicious waffle fries. We've never had a problem there. Throw in the interior playground and it's our favorite place to eat. Because we're classy like that.

I went to the website and made the reservation. Very fancy. There was zero information, so all I really knew is that we were supposed to show up at 6:15 Monday night. At this point, I told the wife that we had reservations the night before Valentines, but I would not be taking her as my date. I took the liberty of lining up a date for her, but I had a cute young lady in mind for myself. Of course we documented the wonderful evening, you can see us with our dates:

 

The wife is so funny. She had all sorts of questions, and I kept trying to tell her I didn't know anything except show up at 6:15. But she kept asking questions. I'm trying to be less sarcastic, but I had to poke a little fun at her.

Wife: "What should I wear?"
Me: "Well, I'm wearing a tuxedo and tails, so maybe you should go with a Versace gown?"

Wife: "Do you know what kind of food they're going to have?"
Me: "Definitely filet mignon. I heard they're changing their name to Cow-fil-A."

Note to self, don't be sarcastic to the the wife or you definitely won't have the opportunity to have a third kid in November 2012.

When we arrived, they had set a part of the restaurant aside, put up a maitre d stand, tablecloths with flowers and candles, and turned off half the fluorescent bulbs in the section for ambience. The menus were your standard Chick-fil-A fare only written in a fancy font. They took orders at the table and delivered food. I went with the spicy chicken sandwich, while my date opted for a tub of peas she brought from home. Nice, she's didn't go for the most expensive item, but it was a little weird to bring your own food.

The wife had the grilled chicken salad while her date enjoyed chicken nuggets. Literally, he enjoyed them by putting his face down in the plate they brought them on so as to keep his hands clean. They must have been delicious because they disappeared in a hurry and he asked nicely to be excused to play on the playground. By ask nicely, I mean he tried to crawl under the table and shove his lovely date out of the way while complaining loudly.

My date was a little grumpy since we weren't shoveling peas into her face as fast as possible. Once we were able to get some food into her, she did settle down and we had a wonderful conversation while the wife and her date spent some quality time on the playground. When the check arrived, my date offered to pick up the tab, but since I am a fancy gentleman, I refused her generous offer and covered everyone's meal. I figured the wife's date would try to dine and dash since he is usually dashing everywhere and he hasn't bothered to find a job or pay rent yet.

Can I get that Daddy, I'm not high maintenance. Yet.

On our way out, we were presented with gifts. The wife got a carnation, Daddy got a free chicken biscuit coupon. Owen and Lily each received gift bags with a cow beanie and a free chicken biscuit coupon. The carnation was instantly stolen by the wife's date and it was brandished throughout the restaurant and parking lot like a weapon. I'm pretty sure he was defending his date against all the other preschoolers that brought their Mommies. Of course, it didn't take long to snap the carnation stem so now it's in a much smaller glass on our table. But Daddy scored the biggest. Three free chicken biscuit coupons? Thank you very much. Not to mention February is buy one get one free chicken biscuits for Dads that bring kids in on Friday mornings. I got a free one last Friday, will get a free one this Friday, and still have 3 free ones over the next few weeks. Best. Valentines. Ever.

CK