The nagging started weeks ago. "Momma, I want to go see Santa," the Toddler would say. Over and over. And over and over. There were a few false starts in the quest to appease She Who Had Things to Tell The Big Guy, but tonight was the night. Tonight I picked the kid up from school with full intentions of taking her to see Jolly Old Saint Nick.

"What are you going to tell Santa you want for Christmas?" I asked the Toddler.

"Penguin game!" she would say.

"Are you going to sit in Santa's lap?" I asked.

"Yeah!" she would enthusiastically reply.

I was positive she was lying. Not about the Penguins game part, that I believed. I didn't believe her that she was actually going to tell it to Santa. If history is an indicator, she was sure to be all about Santa, right up until the moment she was close enough to smell the booze on his breath and kid pee on his pants. So, I figured the perimeter to be about ten feet or so.

When we first walked into the mall, the line to chill with Santa was a long one, so we wandered upstairs to visit the Mouse for a bit. As Alexis ran all over Mickey's store telling me she wanted the Daisy t-shirt, the Minnie dress (btw, BOO-YAH! It's already under the tree!), the Cinderella figurines, the Minnie pajamas, and the four-foot tall stuffed Minnie, I kept telling her, "Well, I guess you'll have to tell Santa you want that, too!"

She agreed. "Yeah, I tell Santa!"

We finally emerged from The Disney Store empty-handed and found the line for Santa had gone down significantly. I repeated my, "Are you sure you want to go see Santa and sit on his lap?" interrogation and was met with the smiling face of an excited little girl as she grabbed my hand and drug me towards The Big Guy.

We got in line and spent ten minutes listening to an elf's spiel about photos. I'm not sure why I should select a portrait package when portraits don't yet exist, but I had no problem just rambling, "Two 5x7's, please." I knew it wasn't going to happen.

As we moved closer and closer to Santa, Alexis continued to express her enthusiasm. "I see Santa!" "Look! It's almost my turn!" "I'm going to tell Santa I want Penguins!" and on and on.

I started to believe.

And yet, I didn't.

We moved closer and closer, and suddenly we were next. I looked down at Alexis and asked, "Are you ready to go see Santa?"

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!" she replied as she crumpled into a little pile of frightened Toddler goo.

That's all right, kiddo. You just keep on being scared of strange old guys in red suits who promise you toys and claim to not want anything in return.