There should be some sort of law that dictates that kids can't act like jerks on days when you have plans to hang with them. Or, if there is such a law, somebody really needs to come read it to Alexis. Slowly. With perfect diction. Twice.

For weeks Alexis has been excited about going to Stomp. WEEKS. I was a moron and mentioned it to her way too soon, so I had the pleasure of enduring her daily inquests into, "Is it Stomp today?" for many, many days. When it finally was "Stomp today," the kid was soooooooo excited. WAY too excited. I don't know how it is that she loves going to the theater, but she does, and she was soooooooo excited all day that she just couldn't contain herself.

Nor could she nap.

Lots of people have tried to tell me the kid is too old to still need her afternoon nap. Interestingly enough, none of them were around between 2:00pm and 4:00pm on Saturday when The I Haven't Had a Nap Monster made her appearance. Her head spun, her body convulsed, her mouth spewed hateful words, and that was all within the span of two seconds. What she did with the other one hour and 59 minutes and 58 seconds was even more impressive.

She. was. awful.

She was so awful that I was ->thisclose<- to pulling the plug on the whole thing. It's not really my idea of fun to drag a screaming, naked (long story, but basically she decides she hates every article of clothing she owns) brat into a darkened theater. If I had gotten the tickets for free I definitely would have pulled the plug, but I didn't, so I couldn't.

When it was time to leave, I literally carried her kicking and screaming and still mostly naked out to the car and pinned her down so I could buckle her seat belt. It was SO fabulous. The most amazing part of that little piece of parenting FAIL was that no neighbors called the cops. I'm sure they were tempted.

We didn't even make it out of our 50-foot long driveway before Alexis fell asleep.

Thank goodness.

When we arrived downtown, I opened the car door and gently woke the kid up. Her eyes popped open as her mouth blurted, "Is it Stomp today?"

"Yes, it's time for Stomp right now," I told her.

She sprung out of the car faster than the Roadrunner can dodge a Wile E. Coyote death trap then proceeded to love every single second of the production, particularly the audience call and response part at the end.

I'm hoping to take her to Pittsburgh Ballet's Sleeping Beauty next month, so could someone please get her that Don't Be a Jerk memo before then? I don't think I can survive another appearance by The I Haven't Had a Nap Monster.