Seven-Year-Olds Love Cheeseburger Pranks and Yogi Bear in 3-D; So Suck It Up, Grownups

Kids think pies in the face are hilarious. They're not wrong, so get over yourself.

The Movie: Yogi Bear in 3-D at Lincoln Square Cinemas (two floors above M & S's.)

The Screenplate: Sometimes you just have to do right by the little people in your life. They'll be the ones changing your diapers in your sunset years after all.

Yogi is the story of the talking, picnic-basket-stealing bear and his sidekick Boo-Boo (voiced by a better-than-he-needs-to-be Justin Timberlake.)

The movie stars Seattleite Anna Faris as a nature-loving documentary film maker and Tom Cavanagh--and his perpetually bewildered looking, disconcertingly iridescent blue eyes--as the hapless ranger.

The plot is a camp movie standard: evil mayor wants to sell the land to developers; hijinks to save it ensue along with a host of site-gags involving bear asses (ba-dum) and a frog-tongued turtle.

Flash, like most of the kids that filled the vast majority of the seats, laughed so hard at points he stood in the aisle. "That was so funny!" he turned to me and declared as the credits rolled.

Who am I to argue? Sure I might have preferred something with a little nuance: an occasional contemporary political reference or double-entendre designed to give the adults a snicker. But Flash loved the movie and I loved the hilarity that is watching him snort soda out from nose when Boo-Boo gets his grove on. Sometimes you just gotta a meet a kid on his level.

And speaking of places that are ready to meet a minor, we ended up at McCormick & Schmick's after desperately searching for a traditional food court at Bellevue Square which to get Flash's requested burger. Finally giving up in the holiday crowds, I made an executive decision (which is something you get to do when you're the biggest.) "We're going back to that place below the theater," I said.

Flash agreed--mostly because he wanted to go over the sky bridge connecting the two malls again. "Cooooool!" he said.

It turned out we should have just started at M & S. Sure it seems a little too schmancy for a date with a first grader. But the second we sat down someone showed up with crayons, a placemat filled with coloring and games, and a few healthy snacks. You won't get that from a food court McDonald's.

The kids burger is basically the same thing as the adult version with fewer bells and whistles and several dollars knocked off the price. Flash passed me his lettuce, pickle, and onions, then dove in.

"The cheese is the best part," he informed me. Hard to argue with cheddar.

With about a third of a burger left on his plate, Flash and I were packing up when he got a mischievous grin on his face. "I'm putting it in my napkin," he whispered. "Then, when the they take it back, they'll say 'why is this napkin sooo big?' And they won't be able to squish it down, and when they wash it, they'll find a cheeseburger inside! It will be so funny!"

I told the allegedly responsible adult in me to shut up, snickered, and let him do it.