"These should give you the grounding you'll need in thermodynamics, hypermathematics, and of course microcalifragilistics."

Our family schedule calls for lunch at 11:30am. At least, lunch starts at 11:30, what time everybody actually eats is more fluid than the Congressional ethics blotter. I have a good system that lets everyone, occasionally even including myself, finish their meals within an hour. The process starts with me waking the boys, strapping them into their high chairs, feeding them solids, moving everyone to the living room, finishing their meal from bottles, cooking Abbie’s vegetables, cleaning the boys’ mess, washing Abbie’s hands, strapping Abbie into her booster seat with a bowlful of yogurt, letting Abbie feed herself and usually the dog while I move the boys back into the kitchen where I can watch them, cleaning the horrible yogurt mess, giving Abbie her water, milk, and vegetables, and, finally make and eat my lunch, assuming I still have the energy.

A knock on the door surprised me yesterday as we sat down to step 2. It was an old (childless) friend from college who happened to be in the neighborhood during his lunch break and wanted to know if we wanted to go to lunch. I sat back down to feed the boys while mentally tallying an equation far more complex than anything I encountered in college:

((A + T + M) * L) / G = H
Where A is the amount of baby food, measured in cents, that will go to waste if I abandon it to go out to eat, T is the time in minutes that it will take me to pack everyone and walk out the door, M is how much money in dollars it will cost to eat, L is the likelihood that the schedule disruption will ruin someone’s nap, G is the “getting out of the house” factor measuring how much benefit I’ll derive by escaping the house, and H is the final hassle factor to determine whether or not it’s worth it.

A is about 25 as the boys had a mostly uneaten peach-cereal-formula mixture that would have to be thrown out if we were to leave soon. T is about 15, 20 if someone pooped, 25 if someones pooped. M is only 7 since my friend wanted to eat at the cheap burger place two blocks from home. At least I think it would only be 7; in two years we have yet to eat there. I pegged L at 75% (.75) since I knew we’d return too late to put them down at their regular naptime, meaning Abbie would take all the nap she’d need during the two-block car ride from the restaurant to our home. G would be pretty high, say around 10fc*, if I didn’t have to watch the kids while eating and could concentrate on semi-meaningful conversation. Unfortunately I needed to keep the twins happy while feeding Abbie and trying to work some food into my mouth, which drops the quotient down to .1fc.

After determining the hassle quotient would be in the astronomical range at over 350, I decided not to go out. I did however have him pick up a sandwich for me, and he brought everything back so we could eat together at our home. He returned just as I moved the boys to the living room for their bottle-feeding. I took my sandwich, carefully set it to the side, and finished feeding the boys. My friend chilled with Abbie and watched “Dora the Explorer” while she bummed off his fries. After the boys drained their bottles, I moved Abbie to the kitchen so she could eat her parent-approved lunch.

Eventually, my friend had to return to work. We made sure to exchange at least a couple meaningful words so we could say we talked over lunch. Oh, and I took a couple bites from my sandwich so I could say we had lunch.

* One FC is the amount of happiness I derive from one cone of frozen custard.