No-brainers

Here’s a multiple-choice question for you:

Question: You and your husband go to a Chinese buffet with your baby, who is probably four to six months old and is brought into the restaurant in an infant car seat. What do you do once you’re seated?

Your answer choices:

A: Place the baby in a safe spot and take turns going to the buffet to get your food.

B: Put the car seat on top of the table, near the edge, and both of you leave the table at the same time to get your food at the buffet.

Seems like it would be a no-brainer to me, but I would choose answer A. And perhaps I’m being a bit judgmental, but I couldn’t help but wonder about the couple who chose B yesterday when The Husband and I had met at a Chinese buffet for lunch. The Husband and I look at each other as they walked away, obviously silently asking the same question in our shared, knowing look to each other: “They didn’t really just do that, did they?”

There are several issues here, but two that worry me the most. The first is obviously that someone could have easily taken their baby and gotten away with it before they could do much about it, as they didn’t even seem to be particularly concerned with peeking back at the table as they loaded up their plates. I love me some crab rangoon, sure, but I love me a baby way more. I almost wanted to go over and start walking away with their baby just to make a point, but I would never actually do that. And two, if they’d read their car seat manual, they would’ve seen that it’s not safe to place a baby in the car seat on top of a table, especially when the baby has the ability to rock the car seat and possibly send it crashing off the edge of the table.

It turns out it’s the mom and dad in question here who are the no-brainers, not the question itself.