Monday, December 6, 2010

Me & G ...

Garrison has an affinity for extra credit. If any teacher offers ANY type of extra credit ... he's all over getting it done ... and quickly! Currently, he is reading A Christmas Carol in his English class and his teacher offered an AMAZING dose of extra credit, one that would raise his grade from a B to an A+. The task was to go to the Herberger Theater in Phoenix and see A Christmas Carol and then to get an autograph from his friend who had a starring role in the play. F-U-N!


So on Saturday, the two of us hopped on the 202 and headed East. In downtown Phoenix, there are few parking spaces other than parking garages that charge $7.00 ... but it was a special day, so we parked. We skipped (but not really) across the street and into the box office. I was told that this showing was a discounted rate, but I heard the cute young voice on the other side of the glass window say "That'll be $41.00 please." I heard myself mumbling "holy crap", but it was a special day, so I paid the lad through the tiny hole in the glass window. We sat on the front row of the balcony and it was a lovely, very well done play.

Note: My definition of a well done play = short.

After the play was over, we made our way down to the lobby to find the lady in the green dress to get her autograph and seal the deal on the extra credit. Deep breath. Job accomplished! Since we were already paying to park in downtown Phoenix, I decided that we couldn't quite be done yet. We walked across the street to one of my F-A-V-O-R-I-T-E places of all time. Seriously, this place runs a close second to Disneyland for me! The Hyatt Regency Hotel, or more specifically ... the glass elevator at the Hyatt Regency Hotel! If you ever want to step into Willy Wonka's shoes for just a moment and feel like you're going to burst through the top of one of the tallest buildings in Phoenix ... as you are soaring and seeing the sights of the valley for miles around, then you just have to do this!


We rode that elevator up & down three times and then headed back over to the parking garage to pay our $7.00 and head home. It was a lovely day. G was super happy to have achieved such extra credit and I was happy that I got to spend some alone time with him.


On the way home, I started wondering about all of the other kids that clearly would not be able to afford such status from the teacher. This was a pricey request! I am glad that I was able to have this day with Garrison and to be able to give him something that meant a lot to him, but if I was not able to do this ... I think I would hunt down that teacher for putting such ideas in my child's head! And really ... what did the student actually have to do to obtain these points?

Parking on the third floor of a concrete garage = $7.00
Seating for 2 at the Herberger Theater = $41.00
Riding my favorite elevator with G = $0
Achieving such extra credit in Junior High = Priceless $48.00

1 comment:

Diane Miller said...

Too funny! I would have had to nix-a this idea myself, but the lasting memory AND good blogging material is priceless!