The day after Christmas, we headed to the Consol Energy Center to see The Harlem Globetrotters.  The closest I had ever gotten to seeing them prior to this was on old Episodes of Scooby Doo.  (They either did that a lot or I watched the same episode over and over again.)  And I watched Flight Time and Big Easy on Amazing Race.  So I’ve seen them solve crimes and traipse all over the world, but never actually seen them play basketball.

We got there just in time for the game to begin.  It’s definitely a show for kids, and mine loved it.  There was probably a bigger rivalry between the referee and Big Easy than the two teams, and it made the story line all the more fun to follow.  The basketball feats were just as awesome as you’d expect them to be.  We were especially excited when they introduced the team’s female player.  She was great!  And it showed all of my kids that they can excel at sports, regardless of gender.

Towards the end of the first quarter, we started breaking down.  Big G came out to dance, and I couldn’t keep the kids in their seats.  Not because they were bored.  No, that would have been a great problem to have comparatively.  It’s because they thought it was their turn to go down on the court and play.  I chased one down the aisle steps while another one chased down the cotton candy man.  We played this through a couple of times before we decided to take a break ourselves.

To get the excitement out, we let them run a couple of laps around the arena’s concession halls.  I don’t know how they weren’t tired after that.  I was.  We decided to try sitting in our seats again, but all they wanted to do was run onto the court.  Again.

So we left.  The upside?  Our kids had a great time.  They loved the show; they just wanted to play basketball themselves.  If we had been able to stay long enough there’s actually some great opportunities for audience participation.  You might want to wait until your kids are old enough to sit down through an entire performance.  I don’t know.  I see other parents with kids the same age as mine making it work seamlessly.  Sometimes I wonder if I’m doing something wrong, but then I realize that even though we only made it through one quarter, my kiddos had a great time and learned a valuable life lesson: you can’t run onto the court/field/rink during as a spectator at a sporting event.