The Toy Minefield
Posted on 12 26, 2006 under The Manual by Noodad | Comments
This article was originally published in March 2006.
There's nothing like walking quietly downstairs in the middle of the night to get a drink and just when you think you have reached the fridge without making a peep, you step barefoot on a plastic Buzz Lightyear figurine. What do you do? In my case, you try to redirect your feeling of agony by pounding your fist on the counter and you inadvertently catapult a metal crayon canister to the floor . Crayons scatter and now instead of one problem (Buzz Lightyear of Star Command) lodged in your foot, you have 64 assorted Crayolas rolling all over the floor, finally coming to rest, perfectly evenly spaced, as if they were a marching band ready to do the halftime show.
I am quiet so that I don't wake up my sleeping kids. It's not like I'm sneaking downstairs to cheat on a diet, surf some porn, or swig my bottle of Jack hidden behind the cookbooks. It's all for my kids: my precious angels that love to leave those miniature death traps on the floor after they are finished playing with them.
This article was originally published in April 2006.
It's really fun to pretend you are Santa Claus. I'm not talking about getting dressed up and putting strange kids on your lap. No, you and your wife get to play Santa the behind the scenes way: you get to eat the cookie leaving a few crumbs in the plate. You get to write special notes to the kids, trying to disguise your handwriting. And, you get to play up the "Santa's watching you, so you better behave" bit. (See my previous article on Using Santa To Manipulate Your Kids)
Kids can be kids which means sometimes, no matter how peaceful you think you may be, you want to just pound the hell out of them. They know, better than anybody, how to get under your skin. They know how to piss you off and then piss you off even more.
There was a time, and that time may be longer for some than others, when you abided by one simple rule when it came to allegiances, "Bro's before ho's." First off, let me make something really clear: The use of the term, "Ho" is in no way meant to degrade females, poke fun of ebonics, nor is it meant to lump all "whores" in one category. It is merely a term used in this phrase because it rhymes with "bro's". Plus, the only other possible phrase that includes a manly trait, a womanly trait, and a rhyme is "Dicks before chicks" and that just sounds like something else all together.
Earlier this week I took the morning off to attend my daughter's Holiday Sing-Along at her school. It was a chance for the kids to sing songs for their parents and to enjoy refreshments together. So why in the world, would I take the morning off from work to go to such a snore fest? Why should you want to go to any of these things anyway? Let's break it down shall we?
If you celebrate Christmas, the countdown is on until the "best day of your kid's life". It started shortly after you polished off the rest of the leftover turkey and right before you made the trek outside to cut down the tree. If your kids are old enough to get excited about Christmas, then they are old enough to appreciate an advent calendar.
“It’s a boy!” announces the doctor as your kid bursts into the world. Congratulations! Deciding on whether or not your son will be circumcised just got bumped to the top of your to-do list. You’ll get all the relevant information to consider from your doctor and/or maternity nurses. You may discuss the matter with friends and family. You may even consult the AAP to see what it recommends (after reading an 8-page PDF with about 150 references in the end notes, you’ll find that the AAP neither recommends nor discourages the surgery—Thanks, AAP!). Like most parental decisions, this one’s up to you and your wife.
Growing up, I vividly recall waiting for the annual airing of the classic Christmas specials. The networks would start advertising right after Thanksgiving, and I’d count the days until I’d be reunited with the Grinch, Rudolph, and Frosty. Even though I knew the outcome of each Christmas special, I still had to see them. Now, thanks to the proliferation of cable stations and licensing agreements, you can’t channel surf in December without running into these specials. In viewing some of these with an older and wiser eye, I detected some extremely negative themes behind the saccharine sweet songs and smiling claymation visages on the screen. 
