Video footage of adults brawling at Chuck-E-Cheese is all over the internet. The most recent incident, caught on film by 16-year-old Krystel Jimenez, took place in Miami, Florida’s Kendall Village Center franchise and reportedly began because one person gave another person some side-eye, prompting a throng of family members to get involved. This is not an isolated occurrence, however. Several others have been reported around the country.
When I first saw the clip, I wondered what kind of trashy adult would get in a fight at a children’s party. Then I remembered what kids’ birthdays at Chuck-E-Cheese are actually like, and I got off my high horse. There are a thousand reasons I feel like throwing down when I’m hosting one of those shit storms. Here are just a few:
-The ticket-to-prize exchange rate is a rip off–it’s like handing over my entire paycheck to the dollar store. My kids set their hearts on those tacky, cheap stuffed animals and become hellbent on winning one to the point that I consider enrolling them in a twelve-step program for gambling addiction.
-No one knows for sure where the Ebola virus began, but probably in the Chuck-E-Cheese ball pit.
-Where do they get their staff? Are they recruiting directly from an anger management class or something? I’ve had better service at the DMV.
-My bitch of a sister-in-law pumps my kid full of candy and then complains about his behavior five minutes into his sugar high.
-Then she makes backhanded comments about my weight. God, I can’t wait to give her son a kazoo and cymbals for Christmas.
-The pizza at Chuckie’s tastes like marinara, farts, and minimum wage.
-My toddler always gets trapped in the tubes and I have to climb in and rescue her with my whale-tale mooning all of the guests from the plastic window on high.
-Munch’s Make Believe animatronic band is the material version of a bad acid trip.
-My son always wants to invite that one hooligan from his class who tears through the mini-arcade like a tweaker playing a game of “bowling for toddlers.”
-Three words: awkward small talk. Not only do I have to regulate Tommy Tweaker’s aggressive play, but I have to chit chat with his horrible parents, politely smiling while they embark on a dipshit political rant about why Trump would make a good president.
-How sticky are those booths? It’s like they replaced the linoleum flooring with fly paper.
-Chuck-E-Cheese on a Saturday is more crowded than the NYC subway in rush hour (and it smells way worse).
-What kind of creep job is inside of that mouse costume? I want answers.
-The soda pitchers become mini paddling pools when the kids try to scoop ice out of them with their bare hands. I prefer my Diet Coke without unidentified debris floating in it, thank you very much.
-My husband becomes completely oblivious to all of the above at these events and just sits in the corner, consuming pizza and cake. Meanwhile, I’m starving and furious because I have spent all my time managing the hell on earth that is a Chuck-E-Cheese birthday party. Normally, I’m against divorce, but watching him stuff his gob has me running through possible attorneys and shared-custody logistics (pretty sure he’d get the kids on a Saturday so that I never have to go to another damn Chuck-E-Cheese party again.)
But y’all, I’m not condoning divorce.
Neither am I condoning violence.
It’s just that I kind of understand how people become enraged enough to brawl at Chuck-E-Cheese.