I've had this happen twice to me. Once from GUM to HNL and another time transcon. The flight attendant in the mainland flight said, "sorry." with a apathetic look. The flight attendant on the Continental Micronesia flight came back after checking something. I was offered free booze for the rest of the flight. I would have expected at least a refund of the headset fee if I had paid for it. Usually, I would just take the opportunity to sleep. I can sympathize with having to travel with children. I'm sure it seems easy to tell parents to bring some books or something, but we've all seen that doesn't always work. Portable DVD players are getting sort of inexpensive. A friend of mine was compensated some miles for the same problem, but on a NW flight.