The Three Most Terrible Things Kids Brought to School for Show and Tell

No, I'm not talking about the countless instances of a child discovering his parent's Rick James-sized stash of cocaine and handing out samples at the local elementary like he was working the deli counter at Wegman's. There's plenty of examples of those to be had in the news:

• http://news.yahoo.com/delaware-mother-charged-daughter-brings-heroin-daycare-073227638.html 
• http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2039507/Child-brings-crack-drugs-tell-school-Missouri.html 
• http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/11/five-year-old-heroin-school

Nor am I talking about a precocious lad sneaking off to class with his dad's howitzer and causing a building-wide evacuation.

This happens so much that just a search on 'guns' and 'school' caused Google News to shut down for an hour.

If I was a more talented writer I might throw in a poigant comment about how nowhere else is the loss of innocence better exemplified than in these types of stories, where a child innocently happens upon his parents' secret vice and brings it in to literally show off to their friends and teachers. I might say how as parents it is our sacred responsibility to shelter our children from the harsh realities of the adult world and to protect their innocence at all costs, for as long as we can. But I'm not, so heres a video of something called the

Afghan Armpit Song. 

Brilliant. Watch that again if you want. I'll wait. Hopefully by now you've forgotten all bout little Sally essentially drug-muling smack to school in her Strawberry Shortcake lunchbox. Not yet? Do you want a hug? C'mere you. Fair warning--I hug too long and utterly the wrong way.

No, this article is about three absolutely horrific, albeit hilarious, items in which kids have brought (and continue to this day to bring) to school all in the name of one-upping their peers. And I talked to a real-life teacher for this article which brings me one step up the journalistic ladder from 'weirdo in his basement left alone with a

computer' to 'muckracker'. But don't worry, I still typed up the entire thing using only my penis.

The teacher I interviewed for this article wishes to remain anonymous because apparently openly mocking your grade school age children is a thing that is specifically spelled out in the teacher's handbook, and because she wishes to continue to eat Ramen noodles for the foreseeable future. For the sake of this article, we'll call her Mrs. Sugartits because I know she'd hate that.

1. Enough Wild Animals to Start a Zoo

Awwww?

Apparently, even in the fairly large city where Mrs. Sugartits works, wild animals run amok. For show and tell, her students regularly bring in stray dogs, cats, and rats. Which is awesome and hilarious, but not really up to my usual standards. So here's a few other examples I found online:

A Lion Cub

http://www.digitalspy.com/fun/news/a442262/children-bring-in-lion-cub-to-school-show-and-tell.html

So Billy brought his goldfish in last week, huh? Well, fuck Billy. Here's a lion cub I found and nursed back to health with my own blood.

There's only a few places where this kind of thing can occur. In Africa  where, if the Lion King has taught me anything, is where lions live (and sing and betray their distant relatives), and areas near absent-minded circus owners (so Russia).

I love this story so much I want to buy it dinner and tell it how it completes me. I love that the kids found this lion cub and, rather than soiling themselves, immediately thought 'we must share this amazing find with all of

our friends!' I love that no one got hurt which is usually the end product of blissful stupidity and abandoned man killers. And I love that the article sort of hints that this 'aint no thang' in Russia. Which is cool and all but it's not transmit rabies and malaria cool. Which is what this kid attempted to by bringing a live bat to school:

A Rabid Bat: 

http://dailyridge.com/headlines-now/2010/04/19/boy-brings-live-bat-to-school-for-show-and-tell/ 

Do I even have to mention this happened in Florida? Because it did. And though I'm too lazy to Mapquest the city, I'm guessing it was in the northern part because hat's where the real, pun totally intended, batshit activity always happens.

Most of the article focuses on rabies prevention tips which is perfectly understandable because it's not like the bat was a pet in a cage. No, the kid kept it stuffed in his backpack. That is, when he wasn't passing it around for the other kids to pet. Which they did because, well, they're kids.

2. Sex Toys!  Most parents know to lock up their weapons. So why do they think it's okay to leave their vibrators lying around the house like sporting equipment? 

You do not want to see the graphic I had for this. Nor the caption.

According to Mrs. Sugartits, she sees a sex toy at least once a semester. And not like a little purring dildo. We're talking the jackhammer equivalent of the sexual enhancement world. Items with spikes where spikes should not be. Various lubes and edible items that even a goat would turn its nose up at. Pictures. Indecent, horrible, unflattering pictures.

And what do you do when a kid shows up with a ballgag and something called a 'Rotating Pork Sword'? Do you confiscate the item? Um, no, because gross. Do you calmly explain what it actually is? (Hint, it's not a fancy electric toothbrush. Your dad may be a dentist but no one cares THAT much about their teeth?). According to Mrs. Sugartits, "You politely smile, keep the 'tell' portion as short as possible, and call on the kid who brought in the wounded and bleeding raccoon.  I could add a few links to some hilarious stories of preschoolers dragging in something called a sybian to school, but my internet cache is suspect enough.

3. So Many Body Parts

Fortunately, this next entry is more a yearly than a quarterly occurrence, but I contend that any frequency of a child bringing in a severed body part to school is too many.

So apparently the world that we live in--you, me, Gary Busey, that really hot postal worker--is a broken world. A world in which children have frequent access to severed limbs and brains in jars. It's also a world where apparently people nonchalantly go hopping along without reporting the unexpected theft of an appendage.

And what happens when a child discoveres that lonely body part? They pack it up in tinfoil and bring it to school, of course. 

Here's a story where a parent thought it would be cute to drag a severed arm into a room full of kids (it wasn't even his arm for gosh sakes):

http://forums.nyyfans.com/showthread.php/55347-Parent-Brings-Cadaver-Arm-for-Show-and-Tell 

Search around a little while. You'll find similar stories of brains in jars, mummified hands, and what one teacher assumed was a finger, but I'm going to pretend was someone's detachable penis (I'm a huge King Missile fan).

Mrs. Sugartits, who has been in the teaching game for almost a decade, has encountered more than her share of severed limbs because, "Many of the students' parents are doctors." Doesn't really explain a lot though. I work in computers but I don't get to take servers home with me. You'd think a doctor might be under just a little more scrutiny than say, an underpaid office worker.

Still, you've got to enjoy the mental image of a little kid explaining why the severed hand of the prisoner he brought to school is not cursed and most certainly will not crawl across the floor like Thing in the Addams Family while everyone around him loses their shit.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________

So the next time show and tell runs around, lock up the pictures of you and your husband in your little Bo Beep outfits. Hide the french ticklers and the wild squirrels. Dispose of your body parts properly. Mrs. Sugartits is waiting for you. And she's judging you. 

Sideline Coaching: My First Foray into Kid's Sports

I am not what you'd call an athletic person. It's not that I lack athletic ability --growing up I played soccer, baseball, did some cross country--it's just that I don't possess any interest in sweating, getting dirty, or breathing hard. Three things I am told are pretty much essential to any sport. Unless self-loathing and anger-eating count as sports. In which case, I've been training for them my whole life.

Oh my god, this tastes like love!

I am also not a rabid fan of sports. I watch football on Sunday, but only because it provides a ready-made excuse to sit on the couch and demand food be brought to me. But I don't schedule my weekends around games and when my team loses (and they ineveitably do because nothing I associate myself with can succeed), I don't lose any sleep over it.

What I'm saying is that sports and I are like distant cousins--sure, we share some blood, but not enough that we couldn't bone in the coat closet during an uncle's wedding and feel weird about it. Which is why it came as a total shock to me that when my son first started playing a sport and I suddenly became this guy:

Mercy is for the weak. Here, in the streets, in competition: A man confronts you, he is the enemy. An enemy deserves no mercy. Now go win the PumpKin Fun Run or you sleep outside tonight.

The first thing my son ever competed in was a 100-yard dash on a track. He didn't want to do it, but I pushed him into it because 1) My parents are runners, 2) I used to run, and 3) the other kids looked soft and weak and I was sure we could beat them. And yes, I'm aware that I said 'we' here as if I was somehow competing as well, but in this case it's also true.

In order to convince my son Alex to run, I said I would run with him. And I didn't care who I had to knock over to win.

Above: Police artist rendition of how I appeared to the children.

But for some strange reason, the coaches did not want a lumbering late 30-something year old bald man running alongside a bunch of preschoolers. So instead I ran on the opposite side of the fence, in front of the bleachers during the race.

Hurdling over the wheelchair bound and small pets alike.

And from the moment the gun went off for the start, I yelled encouragement to my son who was getting overtaken by everyone on the field. Including an old lady power-walking on the outside row.
I screamed like a freaking madman, "C'mon, you can do it," in a delirious and fevered bout of competition-itis, barely managing the clarity not to add "Wussy" to my shouts.

And by the time he crossed the finish line, nearly in tears mind you, I realized what a horrible monster I had become. Or rather I realized what a horrible monster I had inside me all along, just waiting for a competition I actually cared about to unleash itself (seemingly one in which someone sharing my genes did all the work, while I sat idly by and took the credit for any success). 

This is what's known as a defining moment. I could have rushed out to the store and bought Alex a $100 pair of track shoes and made him train for twelve months straight so we could avenge the Wasserman name the following year (I mention this idea because it came to me almost immediately). Or I could just realize that my role as a father is not to mentally scar my children, but to encourage them at every step. To acknowledge that the only losing is not trying.

I went home, watched Rocky I, II and III and vowed never to be that guy again. I encourage Alex to play sports, but I always let him pick which one. I take him to every practice but I let the coach do the coaching. I'm at every game on the sideline, clapping and yelling in what I hope is just the approrpriate amount. I'm sure it is because I doubt my wife would let my craziness go unchecked without at least a little kick to the groin.

That is not to say that I don't have the emotional equivalent of an orgasm when he scores or does something spectacular, but a win and a loss don't matter anymore. He's out there, in the game, and that's all that counts.
For his part, he seems to have escaped my initial foray into nightmare parenting. He shrugs off losses the moment the ref blows the whistle. He has fun with the kids on his team. He enjoys sports. He is, in short, a normal, healthy kid.

And for my part, I won't point out that his current soccer team is undefeated and he's leading the team in goals. Because that just doesn't matter. I won't think about scholarships or him turning pro or thanking me during a post-World Cup Celebration. Because none of that would ever cross my mind. Yesirree. My victory is not ruining him completely and that's better than any endorsement deal. Even if it was Wheaties and they wanted to picture both of us on the box.

11 Kids Costumes That Tell the World You're a Horrible Parent

Halloween is that special holiday that allows a certain amount of leeway when it comes to bending cultural and societal norms. It's the one day of the year when I can dress up as a woman and hang out at the docks without enduring the hateful stares of confused sailors. 

Even our kids get to enjoy a taste of this freedom as they are unleashed upon the neighborhood in varying states of dress in order to beg for candy. But occasionally, costume makers get a little drunk on this creative freedom and we end up with outfits for children that would be more at home in Paris Hilton's wardrobe. Certainly understandable. Artists that go unchecked are never a pretty thing. But when the parent decks out their child in a Fredericks of Hollywood outfit and send them to the registered sex offender's house to beg for sweets, that's when your parenting skills need to be called into question. Here are 11 costumes you should never, ever buy for your kids: 

11.  Kiss Costumes

Finally, an outfit your kid can wear while singing 'Naked City' to his grandparents during Thanksgiving dinner.  You could almost excuse the Gene Simmons costume. I mean is there anything more wholesome than an 8-year old throwing devil horns around and sticking his tongue out like Miley Cyrus. But Peter Fucking Crist? That's just child abuse.

I want to rock all night and party every day...after nap time.

10. Police Officer

This is a perfectly acceptable costume.

But then the designers made some subtle, yet important changes when it came time to designing the girl's version of this costume. See if you can spot the differences.

Thigh-high boots? Check? Handcuffs instead of gun? Check. Miniskirt? Check. This isn't a police outfit. This is a stripper police outfit.The sleek material is clearly designed so when some perv tries to grope your little darling, he'll slip right off. Did this seriously require two different designs? Is this a division of the police force I'm not familiar with? Really, the only question this outfit doesn't raise is who's going to get a visit from social services in the next few days. 

9. Scream 

"I'm feeling a little woozy here, man."

"Why?"

"Your kid keeps stabbing me."

"Oh, ha, ha. It's Halloweeen."

8. Michael Jackson

Dressing up your child as bait for a pedophile is one thing. Dressing him up as a convicted child molester. Is a whole other ball of responsibility.

 Who's wearing a white glove and likes to touch little boys? This guy!

7. Biker Guy

It's bad enough when Uncle Rex comes to visit at Christmas, now poor Timmy is starting to dress like him. This costume brings all the subtle costume nuances of the Blue Oyster dancers from Police Academy with the tattooed, mentholated white trash whirlwind you've come to associate with your brother's seasonal visits. 

6. Pinhead

In case you haven't seen Hellraiser, Pinhead is a torture demon from Hell. He dresses in leather, accessorizes in needles, and has killed more innocent people than George Bush. So of course there's a kid-sized version of this costume.

 5. Naught Devil

There are plenty of perfectly acceptable devil costumes for kids out there (unless you live in the Bible Belt), but this one borrows just a little too much from the whole sluttified genre of adult costumes. From the corset, wenched up boob design, and the frilly miniskirt, you've just sent your daughter into the world with a big red A on her lacy dress.

4. Gringo

This was fortunately not a line that the costume makers chose to expand otherwise we might have gotten the bagel-gnoshing Jew or the laundry-washing Chinaman. Instead we're left to wonder at what might have been and to what neighborhoods it's appropriate to send little Johnny to beg for candy. Certainly nowhere in Miami, I can tell you that.

 3. Hannibal Lecter

Yes, that Hannibal Lecter. The man who ate a man's brains directly out of his head. Just, just wow. Could it get any more appropriate than this?

2. Michael Myers

Of course it could. At least it can't get worse than the star of the hundreds of Halloween movies. An unstoppable juggernaut who has stabbed his way through two decades of unfulfilled horny teenagers.

1.  Walking Dead- Sheriff Rick Grimes

Silly me.

Dear irresponsible parent. Stop picking out your kid's costumes. You have no sense of judgement.

Five Things to Do While Furloughed

My wife has given me instructions to come up with a list of things to occupy myself while I'm stuck at home during the furlough. Her exact words were actually, "If you don't get out of my face, I will rip out your spine through your throat." 

Now next time I tell you to vacuum, maybe you'll do it the first time. 

Women can sometimes be difficult to read, but after 13 years of marriage I am finally able to navigate the subtle vagary of her speech. What she actually wanted was for me to come up with a list of things that will keep me occupied during my time off, nourish my longing for a sense of accomplishment and keep me stimulated. Or she would indeed reach into my mouth and pull out my spine. 

Here's what I came up with for the week (because I'm harboring some misplace optimism that this will be resolved soon):

1) Monday- Clean my daughter's room. 

I've put aside a full day for this because, and ladies I hope I'm not ruining any of your mystery here, women are slobs. They are not delicate and flowery butterflies who emerge from a cocoon of light. They are disgusting pigs who leave a path of ruin and destruction in their morning preparations. Don't believe me? 

  

2) Tuesday- Clean My Son's Room
Again, another full day. Because while women at least maintain an appearance of orderliness, men fart in orderliness's general direction.

3) Wednesday- Play with Legos
I have a large collection of Legos which I bought off Craigslist ostensibly for the kids, but let's face it I am a giant child. And on Wednesday I'm going to play the shit out of them. And maybe watch Zombie Strippers and drink Mountain Dew with real sugar while I do it. It's going to be awesome.

4) Thursday- Go for a run. 

When I was actually in shape, I used to run on these beautiful dirt trails near the historic Savage river. While on furlough, I have gained 5 pounds from self-loathing eating. Add this to the other 15 extra pounds I gained from general self-loathing and it's not a pretty sight. I've allocated the full day-- 1 hour to drive there and run and 5 hours to puke and dry heave.

5) Friday- Go for a bike ride and then play video games all day.

I doubt I'll be ready to do another run but a 5-10 mile bike ride is something I can probably handle and it'll make me feel much less guilty about sitting on the couch for the remainder of the afternoon playing video games. Plus, with the ankle injuries and cuts I know I'm going to sustain, I'll be good for doing little else. Now I'm not a gamer by any means, but I contend that's more of an issue of free time than free will. And who knows? Maybe I can turn shooting zombies into a future career. 

Bring it on world! Jamie is back. 

Sequescation: Day 4

Sequescation- An unplanned vacation courteous of government stupidity; similar to staycation, but substitute Pina Coladas on the deck with Ramen noodles in the dark. 

Oh, it's gotten bad. Yell at the geriatric volunteers manning the GOP booth at the local village fair bad. Which I totally did today and don't feel bad at all about. Even when the woman told me she was just here so she could get out of the house more.

The furlough has gotten 'intrude on my weekend bad'. Which I really take offense to. I used to long for Friday night the way a Tijuana prostitute longs for a dose of relief-giving penicillin. And it's totally not a selfish longing. It's not about sleeping in late which is physically impossible to do in my house unless you're the sort of person who could curl up inside the running engine of a 747 for a short kip. And it's not about going drinking with friends--all my old buddies have been reduced to names on the chat screen of my iPhone and exchanges that read like the deranged close captioned typing of a Married With Children episode as captured by a drunken hobo.

No, the weekends are all about my kids. We go on real life adventures. Go-Karting, paintballing, I know you did not bring my kids to a monster truck show type adventures. Glow sticks often figure prominently. It's awesome. It's also my reward for a miserable week and seeing the look on my kids faces while they're doing fucking flips on a trampoline the size of an Olympic swimming pool reminds me why I work in the first place. 

I'm Julie and I'll be your cruise director. Have you guys ever participated in a crash derby? Well, get your fucking helmets on and buckle up. And remember...don't tell your mother.

But after nearly a week of not working, the weekend is just another damned day, no different than the last four days I spent at home working on my manifesto and sending packets of flour to my congressman. And summoning the energy for my kids who are raring to go after a long week at school is, well, difficult. 

As a father, that's the last thing I thought I'd ever say. I never wanted to be a dad who treats their children as a chore. I want to be a fun dad, who enjoys his kids as people. Who'd go out and have a beer with all of them if such things were legal in this small-minded country of ours. Like my dad did for me (the fun outings, not the beer drinking). 

I see on the news that congress has actually found something to agree on. They voted unanimously to give federal workers backpay. I'm as excited to learn that I'm going to have a paycheck for this lost time as I am that the dems and ball-sucking republicans are finally seeing eye to eye on something.  Wonderful, just make it fast boys until something much more precious than money is lost. 

I'm speaking, of course, of the kill your own turkey weekend I have planned with the kids in November. Don't worry, I'm not crazy enough to give my kids a gun. They have to strangle the turkey with their bare hands, otherwise Thanksgiving is cancelled.

Furloughed: Day 1 (My Marriage Declines)

Apparently, after I leave for work in the morning, my household becomes a finely tuned and fragile ecosystem and any introduction of a foreign body (i.e., me) can destroy what routine my wife has carefully built.

In this scenario, I am the Exxon Valdez.

Even the presence of me sleeping in bed at 8am was enough to annoy her as it prevented her from turning on the lights to get dressed. This elicited a deep sigh which was enough to rouse me. It was a sigh that I am well acquainted with. It chilled me to my very bones (largely because I knew a kick to the groin usually follows).

In the living room, I turned on the TV which apparently is a cardinal sin as every set of small eyes were immediately drawn to the magic box and distracted from their morning responsibilities.

When I left to go upstairs to watch the news, I left behind me an endless wake of questions about my presence from my kids that had my wife sighing even more.

When I returned to the kitchen, I could not take a step without occupying space that my wife either needed or was planning on using.

When she left with the kids in tow, vague threats were made about my finding something useful to do like cleaning the house or doing some errands, which, let's face it, is just setting me up for more failure.

Please don't let this drag on, congress. My marriage and groin are in jeopardy.

Explaining the Furlough to My Son (A Transcript)

In which the author tries to explain the government shutdown to his 9-year old son.


Alex: (having overheard a conversation between my wife and I) What's a furlough?

Me: It's when the government shuts down.

Alex: How does that work?

Me: All of the non-critical government employees essentially stop working and go home.

Alex: Are you non-critical?

Me: Um, yeah.

Alex: So you're not working?

Me: Not right now, no.

Alex: Are you getting paid?

Me: No, but we'll be fine.

Alex: Oh, I'm not worried. We're rich.

Me: We are?

Alex: Why did the government shut down?

Me: It's complicated.

Alex stares at me. He will do this for hours until I answer. 

Me: It shut down because the Republicans and the-

Alex: Who are the Republicans?

Me: They're a political party.

Alex: A political party?

Me: Yeah. So the President and Senators and all the people that run the country belong to a different political party.

Alex: Like a religion.

Me: Yeah, but without the morals.

Alex: What?

Me: Nothing. So the different political parties can't agree on how much the government gets to spend for the next year. It's called a budget.

Alex: Like what mom puts you on?

Me: Yes, but instead of complaining about me spending $2 on a Mountain Dew everyday, they're unhappy about billions being spent on free health care.

Alex: What's health care got to do with it?

Me: Abso-fu--

Wife: Honey!

Me: Nothing. It doesn't have anything to do with it.

Alex: So why is health care included?

Me: That's complicated.

Alex gives the forever stare.

Me: Alright, let's say you got an allowance because you actually did something around the house.

Alex: Ha, ha.

Me: And let's say every week you had a list of chores you have to do in order to get your allowance.

Alex: Okay.

Me: And you do all the chores expecting to get your money, but then mommy says you can have your allowance this week, but you're never going to get a puppy.

Wife: Why am I the one denying our child a puppy? You're the one who--

Me: I'm teaching here. Shush. So what would you say? Would you take the allowance knowing you will never, ever get a dog?

Alex: No. Or I'd ask grandpa for one.

Me: Congress doesn't have a grandpa.

Alex: What about Uncle Sam?

Me: I think you're losing track of this--

Alex: Are we done?

Me: Yes, but do you--

Alex: Can I play the Wii?

Me: As long as we still have power.

Alex: What?

Me: Nothing, have fun. I'll be in the bathroom if you need me.

10 Terrible Things I Learned from Insomnia

Although I haven't yet knocked down the pseudo-death that is turning 40, my body apparently has aged in dog years. As a result, I often have to get up in the middle of the night for an assortment of reasons (e.g., to pee, scream in agony, or change the sheets). As a result, I spend a good amount of time in the living room aimlessly flipping channels until the family wakes up and I have someone to play with. During these sleepless nights I've learned some terrible, terrible things about myself, my neighborhood, and the strange and terrifying world around me. Like these:

10. After 2am, there is a lot of porn on TV. A lot. And not just where you'd expect it like HBO and Skinemax. I'm talking History Channel, Discovery. Hell, even Animal Planet gets in on the act.

How hot is that?

9. My next door neighbor who obsessively walks his dogs every hour apparently doesn't sleep. He either owns hounds with the tiniest bladder alive or he's serving some kind of cosmic-penance which can only be repaid by picking up fist-sized chunks of poop. 

8. My wife giggles in her sleep. I thought it was adorable at first, but now I'm beginning to think she's laughing at me. 

7. Sounds are amplified at night. Things like walking down the stairs or opening a door reach decibels only matched by sticking your ear against a Sonic jet engine. 

Granted, I could be a little more gentle.

6. I kick the shit out of video games in the middle of the night. Stuck on a level of Candy Crush? One bought of insomnia is enough to propel me 12 levels forward. If only I could somehow harness this power for good. 

5. Our yard turns into Animal Kingdom at night. Deers. Raccoons. Rabbits. Even a strange bi-pedal hairless creature who likes to press his junk against our window. This may or may not be our weird neighbor with the dog-walking fetish.  

4. Facebook posts do not stop. Even accounting for time zone differences, I am clearly not the only person I know who's awake at ridiculous hours. But probably the one who's up because he's waiting for the sheets to dry. 

The, uh, dog did it.

3. Paranoia sets in. I don't recognize that car out front. And he's been parked there for an awfully long time. What's more it looks just like my car. It's almost like aliens are planning a silent invasion and have begun swapping out everything we know with exact copies. Also, why is my wife giggling again?

No matter, I'm prepared for the alien invasion. In fact, I welcome it.  

2. During the day, I yell at my kids for leaving their toys on the floor. At night, I begin to realize the sheer genius of the arrangement of their junk--they are perfectly situated so that I step on every damn one of them in the dark.

It's like this, but the mines say 'I love you' when you step on them.

1. There is no going back. If I fall asleep now, I'm going to be woken by a small child somersaulting onto my junk. If I go back upstairs, I will only wake up my wife again and incur her wrath for the rest of the day. My only option is to watch some animal porn, knock out a few levels of Candy Crush, and lube up for incoming alien attack. Hopefully, I can squeeze in a nap before the probing starts. 

Having Children Explained- A Primer for My Single Friends

Trying to explain to my single friends what it's like having kids is like thinking a pamphlet is going to prepare you for the sheer invasiveness of a colonoscopy. No matter how many times you read the words 'microscopic camera' and 'colon tract', it's not really going to sink in as to what's happening until the doctor tells you to relax and proceeds to do to you what only Turkish prison guards should be allowed to.

But I'm determined to try anyway because 1) I'm tired of the dead-eyed expressions when I try to describe to my friends why my iPhone is covered in Elmer's glue and glitter and 2) to warn them what their blissfully uninterrupted and guilt-free sex romps can lead to.

I've put my description of child-rearing into terms I know they will understand--drunkenness and it's many stages.

1. 20–79 mg/dL - Impaired coordination and euphoria

This is the first stage of drinking. You're at a bar with a few friends and you've had a couple of drinks. The night is young and there's a really hot blonde at the end of the bar who has glanced your way a few times. You're young, unattached, and riding on the high that only limitless possibility can provide. And Miller Lite. 

This is the newborn phase. You've just brought the baby home from the hospital. You feel so connected to your wife and are hopelessly in love with the tiny, helpless creature in your arms in a way that you never thought was possible. It's like your heart has grown three sizes. The world seems exciting and the future is bright and shining. The baby spends most of its time sleeping and cooing. When you do take the little guy out in public, people flock to you and fawn over the little guy. Why did you ever wait this long to have a baby?

2. 80–199 mg/dL - Poor judgement, labile mood
You're on your fifth drink of the evening. The music is too loud and you don't like the way the bartender is flirting with that blonde because clearly you saw her first. But then your buddy Tom has lit the wrong end of his cigarette and you can't stop laughing. You're indestructible.

The tiny baby who slept all the time is six months old and doesn't sleep at all. You feel dizzy and have a headache all the time. Last night you and your wife got into a fight over sea shells but you can't remember why. But your older friends with kids tell you this is just a phase. You'll get past this. And you know what, when you do see the little guy sleeping, you forget all the anger. He is the most beautiful thing in the world. If only you could get a little sleep.

3. 200–299 mg/dL - Marked ataxia, slurred speech, poor judgement, labile mood, nausea and vomiting
You're in the bathroom puking. The last shot of Jagermeister was a bad idea. So was trying to light your breath on fire. Most of your eyebrows are gone. But that didn't stop you from telling the blonde that she looked hotter from further away, but you'd still be willing to nail her. When you get back to your table, Chumpa Wumba is playing. You take this as a sign to order another round of shots and sing at the top of your lungs.

The baby is walking. And talking. You're participating in playgroups with other parents and, as a result, bringing home every disease known to man. You spend your time getting peed on and cleaning up your puke and your baby's. You order the entire safety section of the Babies R Us catalog and begin turning your house into a fortress. You can't remember the last time you showered or had sex. The last time you tried to masturbate, you fell asleep.

4. 300–399 mg/dL -Anesthesia, memory lapse, labile mood

You're lying on the floor of a bathroom. It's not your bathroom because you certainly would not have bought pink Star Trek towels. You get up. Your eye is swollen shut and you have a fat lip. There's blood on your shirt and you're not wearing any pants or underwear. A woman enters. She has blonde hair and weighs 400 pounds. She asks if you're ready to go again. You ask her if she has any alcohol.


The baby is no longer a baby. He's five years old and in kindergarten. Your wife has put on 30 pounds and hasn't bought make-up since the little miracle was born. But you're not one to criticize. You're balder than the tires on your 10 year old car and, speaking of tires, nice gut fat boy. Still, you both cry the day your bundle of joy leaves on the bus for the first time. At dinner, you wonder aloud if you should have another.

5. 400+ mg/dL - Respiratory failure, coma
You vaguely begin to wonder what happened to all your friends. But after three more beers, you're ready to get back on the horse. Or rather, the horse is ready to get back on you. You feel nauseous, but the only thing that's coming up is your own stomach lining. Somewhere in the middle of the blonde's aerobatic routine, you feel a tightness in your chest. You think might love this girl.

You realize you haven't seen your old friends in over a year. The baby is crying upstairs even though it's naptime and your oldest is screaming because you told him to turn off the TV and do your homework. You wish you were still single so you could go out for a little while, maybe have a beer or two. You begin to do the math of when the kids turn 18 and leave for college. It's a long, long way away and on top of that, how the hell are you going to afford that anyway? You start calculating the years to retirement instead and, when that does nothing to cheer you up, the average life expectancy of an adult male. Your wife tells you that it's a shame that the extra bedroom is going to waste, that maybe having a third wouldn't be so bad. You smile. They are cute when they're small and, plus, you haven't had sex in a really, really long time. 

A Deconstruction of My Son's Homework Procrastination Habits

My wife and I often marvel at how my son can drag out even the simplest task into a 2-hour long ordeal of tears, frustration and argument. Rather than continue to fight him on this, I've decided to try and understand him by applying tried and true scientific principles of observation. Only by doing so can we, as parents, ever hope to find a cure. 

Shown Above: The only photograph known to exist of Alex smiling in the same room as a book.

Wednesday, September 18th

4:05 pm The subject (i.e. my son Alex) arrives home. Immediately takes off shoes and socks, drops kick backpack across the floor. Asks for a snack and, without waiting for a response, disappears into the garage to rifle through the Costco-sized box of assorted chips.

4:15 pm My wife asks me where Alex is. I know where he is. She knows where she is, but neither one of us wants to start yelling at him this early in the day because we know we have to conserve our energy. Instead I send our daughter out to go look for him.

Our garage may or may not lead to Narnia. 

4:25 pm Both children have now been in the garage together for 10 minutes. My wife is staring at me waiting for me to do something about it. I excuse myself to go to the bathroom so I can hide and play Candy Crush. I fail to get past level 184 for the 12th day in the row and run out of lives. Wisely, I do not send my wife a request for more. I hear yelling downstairs so I turn on the bathroom fan to drown out the noise.

 

Seriously, if you have any tips, email me.

4:40 pm I return to the kitchen to find my son sitting at the table, eating chips and staring at the TV. It's Antiques Roadshow; a program designed to cure insomnia. The sound is muted. Alex is staring at it with the same rapt attention he would give, say, Explosive Robot Sumo Wrestling. His books are in front of him, but none are open. My wife is glaring at me.

 Just knowing that we live in a world where this exists, gives me the strength to go on.

4:43 pm I ask Alex if he has any homework. He casually says 'Oh yeah!" and opens his books. I look at Michelle proudly--I've done my duty as a parent. She does not seem to share the same opinion.

4:50 pm Alex is still staring at the TV, but he has a pencil in his hand. This is progress. I turn off the TV. He lets out an, "Awwww" and then glares at his books.

4:55 pm I am still on the couch. My daughter is sitting on me because she has no concept of personal space and I feel someone watching me. I look over at my son. "Hey," he says and smiles. "Hi," I say. "Do you need help with your homework?" I ask. "Oh yeah!" he says and flips through his books.

5:05 pm Somehow Alex has gotten hold of his iTouch. A moment ago, it was on the coffee table. The next it was in his hands. No one saw him get up. My wife snatches it out of his hands and orders him to, "Do his homework already." "I don't feel like it," he says, but it's under his breath and more to himself. We pretend we didn't hear it.

For my next trick, I will refuse to brush my teeth!

5:08 pm My son is now playing with the napkin holder and the salt and peppers shakers. As far as I can tell, the napkin holder is a boat and the salt and pepper shaker are drawing lots to see who will get to eat who. I really want to see this play out, but my wife has gotten up once again,  snatched the items out of his hand, moved everything else non-school related out of reach, and threatened an early bedtime if he doesn't write something down in his notebook. And now. She doesn't even care if it's his name. Just...write...something.

5:18 pm My son announces he is stuck. I get up, because my wife with a Masters Degree from Johns Hopkins, insists that she's not smart enough to tackle fourth grade math.

"What's the date? he asks. I sigh. "Do your homework," I tell him and begin to think of potential threats/motivators. I realize I've exhausted everything in my personal arsenal so I collapse back on the couch. My daughter immediately moves back to my lap.

5:20 pm "I'm still hungry, can I have another snack?" my son says. My wife has reached her breaking point. She has not yet learned to conserve her energy. She screams, "Have you done anything, anything at all, on your homework?" "No," Alex moans. "Then no snacks. You get nothing until you're done your homework." "Fine." He picks up his pencil and for the first time appears to be making progress.

5:23 pm My son announces he is done and is ready for us to check his work. My wife and I exchange confused glances. I look over his math homework. There are ten questions and he has gotten all of them wrong. Including his name and the date. For two of the questions, he just drew a doodle of two guys on a boat underneath. The rest appear to be a sequence of random numbers. "Every one of these is wrong. I don't even know where to begin." He lets out a sigh like I'm the bad guy, like I'm the one who wrote that 20 divided by 4 equals a picture of a shark. He angrily spends the next five minutes erasing his answers.

5:27 pm I am back on the couch. My daughter is now wrapped around me like a koala. Alex is still erasing. If I could reach my phone, I'd look up child abuse laws in Maryland to see what I can and can't get away with. "Do your homework already!" I shout. My wife is smirking.

I love you tree and I'm never going to let go.

5:36 pm My son actually appears to be making progress. My daughter's grip on me is cutting off my circulation so I get up to clatter around the kitchen under the pretense of making dinner. I do not know how to make dinner--this is just my wife's cue to get up and say, "Go sit down. I'll take care of it, you useless ass." She used to mutter this last part under her breath, but lately it's become more of a general announcement. Or a plea for help. It's tough to say at this stage of the game.

My son looks up, and asks, "Can I have--" But my wife cuts him off. "You're not eating breakfast foods for dinner again. We're having chicken." My son slams his pencil on the table and pouts. He's close to tears, but I've noticed the older he gets, the more and more difficult he finds it to work himself into a good screaming fit. My daughter does not have this problem. I ask Alex if he's done. He says, "Almost," and goes back to his homework.

5:43 pm My wife is sneaking swigs from a bottle of cooking sherry. And by cooking sherry, I mean a bottle of wine. My daughter is sitting on my head. My cell phone is dead. All hope is lost.

 The bottle is exactly this size.

"Done," Alex says. Thankfully, I shrug my daughter off to check his answers. They're all correct.

"Wonderful," I say. He happily packs up his books. All is right with the world again.

"Can I play the Wii?" he asks.

"Sure," I say and playfully muss his hair. I'm proud of him. When he buckles down and focuses, he knocks it out of the park every time. There just might be hope for my boy. It might be my imagination, but the sky outside looks a little bluer.

5:44 pm Alex has just turned on the Wii and has the controller in his hand. My daughter is now standing next to me holding my hand because apparently I didn't sit down soon enough. My wife, who had been safely insulated from all the madness in front of the stove, casually asks Alex if he also has any english homework. He groans and slams down the remote. I want to kill her.

5:45 pm The Wii is off. Alex is back at the table. His English books are open, but he is leaning on his arm and glaring at my wife's back. I'm doing the same. We were so close. So close. "What do you have left to do, buddy?" I ask hopefully. I want this over with as much as he does. If he goes quick enough, I can still catch the last of the Antiques Roadshow marathon.

"Just look up and write two definitions," he says. "Okay," I say, "Easy enough. Get cracking."

5:48 pm I tell my daughter to please get off me. She affects the type of hurt expression only seen on dogs after they've been kicked, but I hold to my guns. Circulation is returning to my arms.

 I kicked this dog solely to get this picture.

6:03 pm Michelle announces dinner is ready and ask us to clear the table. I ask Alex if he's done. He says, "No," and is near tears again. "What's wrong?" I ask. "I can't find any of the words," he tells me. "But it's in the dictionary. It's in alphabetic order. All you have to do is...you know what, it can wait until after dinner."

6:36 pm I am done with dinner. My wife is done. My daughter who rivals only the sloth in terms of speed, is finished. Alex, however, is still busy picking every trace of vegetable out of his meal. My wife tells him if he doesn't finish and get back to his homework he's going to have his iTouch taken away. This is a lie. Taking away his iTouch would punish us more than him.

6:50 pm Alex asks if he can be done with his meal. Aside from creatively moving around his food, it does not appear as if he's eaten anything. I tell myself I'll just give him extra money for lunch tomorrow--that'll even things out.

6:53 pm Alex puts his books back on the table and asks if he can have a snack. My wife and I both yell, "No!" at the same time, but at this point we are completely immune to the humor of the situation.

6:57 pm I realize it's bath night. That's another 30 minutes of arguing I'm not prepared for. I'm watching my evening disappear right in front me.

Michelle cleans up the kitchen and I offer to help Alex with the rest of his homework. And by help, I mean show him exactly where the words are that he needs to look up. All he has to do is copy them from the dictionary. How freaking hard is that?

7:16 pm He's still at it. I'm done. Done! I take my daughter upstairs for a bath. Let my wife deal with Alex.

7:23 pm Even over the sound of the water running and the bathroom fan I hear arguing followed shortly by the sound of stomping feet up the stairs. Alex has finally finished his homework, but he has run out of time to play the Wii even though 'we promised.' My wife has ordered him upstairs to take a bath. A whole other set of arguments are about to begin. I take consolation in the fact that in a parallel universe, I am childless and still have a full head of hair.

Total time elapsed: Three hours and 18 minutes (minus 47 minutes for dinner)

Conclusion: So what logical conclusions can we make from this? Arguing does not work. Threats do not work. Pleading obviously does not work. That leaves us with only two choices--drinking and surrender. I recommend both in large quantities. It's only going to get worse when he hits Middle School.

The Ten Types of People You Encounter at Kids Sports Games

I spend a significant amount of time at gymnastics classes, soccer practices, recitals, rehearsals and, on several occasions, several underground fight clubs geared towards elementary age combatants. When I'm not being constantly disappointed at the unreasonable expectations Hollywood sets for soccer moms, I spend my time people watching. And without fail, at every one of these events, I seem to encounter the same people over and over again. Like...


10. The Sideline Coach

Nice shot, dickhead. No dinner tonight. Dinner is for winners.

This guy thinks he's Gene Hackman in Hoosiers, alternately yelling motivating and demoralizing comments from the sideline. Generally, all he does is confuse the kids or destroy their faith in humanity. Still, he's not as bad as...


9. The talker

If I have to hear about her colonoscopy again, I will drive this plane straight into the ocean.

This person isn't there to root on their kid, rather she (and it's always a she) is in attendance to share horrific and embarrassing stories of her life (usually medical in nature). You can try and tune her out, but she also feels the need to talk at a level that could be heard by the pilot of the 747 flying overhead.

8. The magician

They prescribe to the Kaiser Soze school of parenting.

The magician arrives, drops off their kids, and aren't seen again until the ref blows the final whistle. In a way, I admire their impeccable timing.

7. The fan

I don't even care who wins!

This guy really, really loves the sport. A little too much. If it's a soccer game, he's got vuvuzela in one hand and a giant foam finger in the other. If it's football, he's painted his face. He may or may not have a kid on the field.

6. The blind man
This guy is watching the game, it's just not the one everyone else is. He sees fouls where they don't exist and possesses an understanding of the rules that can only be described as functionally retarded. This horrific blind spot for the rules of logic are centered largely around the grassy space inhabited by his child.

That man was clearly off-sides. We should be awarded a free throw and a penalty kick.

5. The foreigner

You can call me a racist prick for saying this, but I've got experience on my side. At every event I run into a family from some unidentified country who use their kid's game to perform some mundane yet wholly inappropriate event like, and once again this is directly from experience, folding laundry, styling their hair, or bicycle repair.

4. The former athlete
For some reason, this guy is always next to me. He used to play the game. He could've gone pro, but then he had kids and well, you know how it is. He alternates between telling me how he would have handled each play, how dumb the coach is, or just how raw a deal he got from settling down and having children.

He also looks like this.

3. The old woman in the shoe

Honestly? I'm just happy to be out of the shoe.

This person doesn't give two fucks about the current population explosion we're experiencing and has 16 children, all of whom are running up and down the sideline (and on occasion across the field). What's more, she also appears to be deaf, blind and dumb because she doesn't discipline her charming brood once.

2. The eater
This person appears to have brought snacks for the entire team after the game, but you are incorrect. Those are for him/her. Do not get between them and the snack bar and do not casually reach for their feedbag for a nibble of Doritos. You will lose that finger. There may be some overlap here between him and the athlete.

Snackbar closes in five minutes? Out of my way bitches!

1. The sarcastic bastard
This jaded sonuvabitch takes delight from mocking others. He craves love and acceptance and mocks others to feel better about himself.

 Hey, wait a minute!

Jamie Wasserman takes delight in mocking others. He's also written a book about tolerance and accepting called Bud the Crud. Buy it or I will show up at a game near you.