...and another thing...

Saturday. A birthday party for a six year old. So, my son is bouncing in the bounce house. I wander over there to see how it's going. I'm standing next to one of the net windows and some little girl, about 8, bounces over. She stops bouncing, puts her hand on her hip, glares at me, and says, "What're YOU lookin' at?" in a totally snotty voice. I was totally taken aback. Why would this little girl be so rude to a friendly, smiling stranger? And I, unprepared, did not answer in a nice mommy way. Instead of saying, "Excuse me, would you like to try asking a little nicer?" or "I'm sorry, but did you know that's not a very polite way of asking?" I just responded with the first thing that came to mind, which, unfortunately, was, "My son. You got a problem with that?" issued with a snide but amused look down my nose. She froze for a second, gave me a nonplussed glance and bounced away.