Let's meet at Starbucks…they have free childcare there!

Because Stephanie is having a bunch of national ladies over for lunch today, I thought I would go to Starbucks to do some lesson prep for next week.  Under normal circumstances, I find Starbucks to be very distracting because of the music and all the people I end up observing, but today was even more difficult.  Apparently, Starbucks is the place where young parents come to catch up with friends and let all the other patrons take care of their kids.  Once they enter the front door, kids are given carte blanche to do whatever they want!  The parents are too busy visiting with their friends or playing on their iPads to realize that I'm having to tell their kids (in Russian) to stop eating the left-overs off of someone's old plate, to stop climbing over the back of chairs, and to stop clanking dishes on the table.  Finally, after they get tired of bothering me, they start running all over the place like we're in Chuck-e-Cheese, screaming, and well…making the decision to do some work at Starbucks a nightmare!