Taken Down, Carni Style

My son, Jack, absorbs episodes of SpongeBob as if his brain was a square yellow sponge, and he likes to repeat pretty much anything SpongeBob says. In one particular episode, SpongeBob shouts out, "Let's take it down Carni-style" (at least that's how my son repeats it) referring to carnival workers. The phrase sounds awfully funny coming out of the mouth of a six year old--until that six year old makes that statement in front of a carnival worker, as he did tonight at The Madonna Carnival in Fort Lee.
It all began when he wanted to go on the bumper cars with his father, and I was going to ride with my daughter, Katie. We got on the long line (16 tickets in hand that the four of us needed to ride the bumper cars--translate $23) and waited.

As we neared the front of the line, my husband Jim began to show signs of panic, but said nothing. Finally, we were next to go on the ride and he said, "I don't think I can fit in the bumper cars." In his defense, he's 6'4 and very big, but he couldn't have said something when we were number 20 in line--he waited until we were number 1? My son said, "No problem, I'll ride by myself," until the ride operator informed him that he was too short to ride alone. My son is very sensitive about his height, given the Amazonian size of his father, and so in response he blurted out, "Let's take this down carni-style."

Now, the tattoos on the ride operator's arms gave no indication that he was a fan of SpongeBob; and I nearly fainted from fear. My husband, unable to hear over the noise of the carnival just stood there and smiled, giving the impression that he was pleased with what my son had just said. The ride operator spoke to my husband, "You think that's funny?" My husband nodded like someone on a weekend pass from an institution, if you know what I mean. I quickly tried to salvage the situation by screaming like the mother of a "carni" at Jack, while profusely apologizing to the man, and made Jack apologize. I told the "carni" my husband was deaf.

He wasn't happy, but he let us on. My husband said he wasn't going on because he didn't think he could fit into the car with Jack; Jack was too short to ride alone; and my daughter was set on going on with me. I pushed my husband through the gate and into a car with Jack, and then got into a car with my daughter. Jim's knees were literally resting on his chin and the safety bar looked like it was perforating his stomach, but the "carni" was smiling because when I rammed the car into Jim's, the shock of the bump sent his knees into his face and it looked quite painful. This did not go unnoticed by my "carni" friend, and that's why he let the ride go on for almost 10 minutes. Let's just say, he took us down carni style.