"Sorry, Santa is booked"

Today my four year old was very much looking forward to seeing Santa Claus at the Temecular Promenade mall. We have been taking our children to see Santa for quite awhile. However today we encountered something unprecedented. At 11 am, a rep told us "sorry, we're booked. We can't allow anyone else in line. The wait is 3 hours from here."

We have waited over an hour for Santa without a problem, and the line in this case was about as long as the ones we have waited in before. However, never has anyone said that they can't continue the line. While I'm not weeping that Nicholas' heart was crushed, what were we to tell him, and more importantly, what about all the other people that were turned away? That kind of thing is pretty upsetting. We'll be writing to the paper about it. It's one thing to have a long line, but another to turn people away if you advertise Santa.