Elijah Sets Michele Bachmann Straight

What an awesome kid.  In case you couldn't hear him, he said, "My mommy's gay, but she doesn't need fixing."

He's eight years old.

Right on, Elijah.

You Can't Say She Didn't Try

We have a rule in our family:  If it makes mommy and daddy laugh, the kid doesn't get punished.  This little girl would have been let off the hook.  No problem.

"Jedi Mindfuck" (Video)

A dad filmed his four year old watching 'The Empire Strikes Back', just as Darth Vader tells Luke Skywalker that he is his father.  His reaction is priceless.

Finally, A Children's Book I Can Relate To

You know you've wanted to say it.  I've said it to myself practically every night for the last year and a half.  Now, you can tell your precious little boy or girl to "Go the fuck to sleep", without feeling like a horrible parent.

Via Amazon:

"Go the Fuck To Sleep is a bedtime book for parents who live in the real world, where a few snoozing kitties and cutesy rhymes don't always send a toddler sailing off to dreamland. Honest, profane, and affectionate, Adam Mansbach's verses and Ricardo Cortés' illustrations perfectly capture the familiar—and unspoken—tribulations of putting your little angel down for the night, and open up a conversation about parenting in the process. Beautiful, subversive, and pants-wettingly funny, Go the Fuck to Sleep is a perfect gift for parents new, old, or expectant. Here is a sample verse: 

The cats nestle close to their kittens now.
The lambs have laid down with the sheep.
You're cozy and warm in your bed, my dear
Please go the fuck to sleep."

Adam Mansbach advised that this is his "first children's book. You probably should not read it to actual children, and if you do, he cannot be held legally responsible."  


The book is not scheduled to come out until October, and it is already the #1 bestseller on Amazon's "Parenting and Families" list.  It looks like I'm not alone at night.

Random Rant

Just a thought related to the last post: Were we really that oblivious to the world when we were kids? I don't remember paying any attention to anything going on in the world around me. I could tell you the president's name and that was about it. I couldn't tell you what was going on in the news. I never watched the news. I never knew about the Iran hostage situation, or the Iran/Contra affair. I remember the Challenger blowing up. I could tell you where I was then. Did the world not matter to us because the U.S. wasn't directly involved? So, it was a "no harm/no foul" type of thing? I'm just curious. Because, as for me, I was clueless back then as to what was going on around me, even when it came to the local news.

And another thing. How on earth did we ever get by without cell phones or watches? You see kids today as young as four or five with a cell phone. I remember riding my bike all day from the time I got up until the time the street light came on outside...no way at all to get in contact with my mom. Sometimes, I would wander miles away from my house. I had no friends. I just rode my bike and maybe play with a kid I ran into along the way. My mom had no idea where I was. I was five or six years old. Who knows what could have happened to me. Were things really safer back then? Were there less instances of kidnapping or child molestation or are they just tracked better today? Are kids smarter today or better informed because of the media?
Are parents today better parents because of technology? Or are they subconsciously righting their parents wrong ways? Some say children are destined to repeat their parents mistakes. Others say that parenthood, not genetics, is the one opportunity to change the course of your family. Only time, and history, will tell.

The Decade According To 9 Year Olds

Very interesting video I saw today that I wanted to share. It was actually sad that these kids are nine and have pretty much lived a life without the luxury of not knowing war or terrorism in their lifetime. They're pretty savvy kids. It's amazing to see how far we've come in the way of technology in just a decade. I cannot imagine what the same interview would be like when my daughter is nine or ten:

The decade according to 9-year-olds from allison louie-garcia on Vimeo.