Dog Night, apparently

So for our month of December, we have this calendar/advent that we use to guide all of our wonderful Christmasy family activities. We sometimes just get a treat. Other times we do an activity. Well, on Tuesday night, the activity read: Go to see Santa at the mall. We figured, Tuesday night will probably be pretty dead at the mall compared to other nights, so the line won't be as long. Boy were we wrong! When we got there, we were greeted by a long line of DOGS waiting (with their owners) to get their picture taken with the Jolly St. Nick. DH and I both agreed that there was no WAY they were paying this man enough to pose with up to (just what we witnessed, anyway) 5, read it 5 dogs at a time and sit there holding their leashes until the matching-sweaters-with-their-dogs owners were satisfied with the precious keepsake. Not that I don't like dogs, or people who have dogs (particularly instead of children) but this is what killed me: There were people there with multiple dogs, spending over $100 on pictures of their dogs with Santa WHILE THEIR SMALL CHILDREN STAND BY not even talking to Santa or sitting on his lap or anything. And they looked sad. I know, they could have already done it another day, but I'm just saying. M sat on his lap and told him he wanted a Rudolph toy, and that his brother (being held at a safe distance away by me) wanted candy. What were we thinking buying all those toys? Of course, last year he asked for a candy cane. We could get away with so much less, but who doesn't want to buy fun things for their kids? So we spent no money on pictures with Santa, which I figured was okay since we had witnessed at least $1500 exchange hands before we even got up to see the big guy.

P.S.- Have you ever tried to find a Rudolph toy in a store? I looked everywhere and all I was able to find was a pez reindeer dispenser that I'll have to paint red to look like him! Sheesh!