no hablo espanol (caution: do not read if sensitive about immigration)

i had been wanting to buy harrison a magnetic toy for the refrigerator. something for him to do while i was cooking or emptying the dishwasher. something, that is, other than "helping" me. i knew those little magnetic letters were too old for him, so i got online to look around for some other ideas. leap frog makes this cute little farm that is perfect. we can practice mooing while browning hamburger, clucking while scrambling eggs...you get the point.

so we had to make a wal-mart run to get more baking soda (my supply has been dwindling due to the bathes), and i thought it might be nice to run through the toy aisle and see if they had the leap frog farm. they did. oh, fun. we bought it, brought it home, opened it, and began playing.

it wasn't until later that i realized the bottom of the farm has a sticker that reads "mis animalitos interactivos". hmmm. i know enough spanish to translate for you: "my interactive animals". i tried to peel back the sticker to see if the english version was underneath. it wasn't. then i looked at the box. the entire box was covered in spanish. i looked at the instruction booklet inside the box. only spanish.

brief interlude:
upon moving to denver, i quickly learned that there are many "mexicanos" in the area. one day, during a quick trip through my neighborhood mcdonald's drive-thru, i was met with the phrase "no hablo ingles". hmmm. i ordered a number 3 with a water instead of coke. what is so "no hablo ingles" about that? when realizing the guy on the other end of the microphone had no idea what i wanted, i yelled, "numero tres con AGUA!!!". not sure that my point was clearly understood. what i was trying to say was, "this is america you freakin idiot! we speak INGLES!".

back to the story:
although disturbed by it, i've grown accustomed to seeing the tacqueria, the joyeria, the panaderia, the carniceria...all on the same street just one block from where i live (which is not "little mexico", although i do endearingly refer to it as such). i've even come to terms with reading burger king's marquee in spanish. further, i'm actually understanding of the fact that manufacturer's now print BOTH english and spanish on their products.

what i am NOT okay with, however, is the fact that i live in the united states of america, shop at one of this country's MOST american stores (headquartered in arkansas, for goodness sake), and, yet, the product i buy is not marketed for english-speaking americans???? are you kidding me?!

assimilate, people!!! assimilate! or should i say...."asimilarse"!?!?!