Today's rant: dinner as a dad

There is one little small thing, totally innocent and nobody’s fault, that gives me a very uncomfortable feeling.  When I pick my son up from daycare, there is this random 4 year old that rushes at me faster that my own kid and hugs me around the waist.  It is all I can do not to scream “STRANGER DANGER” a the doorway of a room filled with children too young for formal education.  Come on, do you know how tall a 4 year old is?  I don’t need that kid hugging my legs.  Not for me, NOT FOR ME!  If this boy does this for a total stranger, come Christmas time, he must act like a coked out wolverine in the cereal aisle of the grocery store ripping open every box just to find and eat the marshmallows.  Good thing daycare is closed for Christmas.  As you can tell, children in general are objectively both funny and scary from my adult point of view.

I have flat-out told my kids that I don’t like going out to dinner anymore specifically because of them.  They fuck shit up.  I almost always end up angry, tired, and frustrated with everyone halfway through dinner.  Firstly, there is the debate of who sits next to mommy.  Nobody wants to sit next to me.  Whenever one is forced to, they start crying.  Then, completely oblivious of the consequences, my wife will say “Just let him/her come here and get the other one”.  What do you think happens?  Right.  The other one will start crying.  I haven’t even sat down yet, and I already want to storm out of a restaurant because the kids can’t stop emitting their high-pitched wails of spoiled fuckery.  Then, there is the blowing of the straw paper across the tables.  That particular trick was taught to them by their grandfather.  Thank you, father-in-law.  I don’t mind if the paper stays at our table, but I do not need to deal with the fuckheads at the booth next to ours when one of them goes rogue.  When the food finally does arrive, after my daughter has asked 6 times when the food will be out because the obviously thinks I have a fucking timer on my watch that is synced to the restaurant’s kitchen, we’re lucky if the kids eat half of their orders.  Sometimes they fill up on fruit or French fries.  On occasion, my son will flat out refuse to eat what has been given to him.  At Olive Garden, despite being told that what he ordered was not a real grilled cheese sandwich, he insists that it is when he points to the stupid little picture on the children’s menu.  When it comes out, he completely loses his shit as if I just told him his grandparents were dead.  It’s a quesadilla-like fucking thing, which confuses the fuck out of me because this is supposed to be a faux-Italian restaurant, not a faux-Mexican restaurant.  The only comforting words I have for him are “Well, I fucking told you so.”  Then all he wants to do is let it stay there.  No one else can touch the food he doesn’t want.  When I go to take a bite, he screams at me.  “Well then you eat it!”  “NOOOO!”

Apparently, my daughter is “graduating” Kindergarten in 2 weeks.  I had to actually use that word when I RSVP’ed “yes” for her teacher.  In my opinion, it is not a graduation.  I wife is getting a Master’s degree on the same day.  THAT is a fucking graduation.  Here is how I see it:  unless you are physically leaving a school with a certificate, diploma, or degree and you’d have to re-register to continue your education, it’s not a graduation.  I swear to God, if my daughter puts “Graduated Kindergarten May, 2018” on any resume categorized under her education, I will personally tear up the resume.

I am glad that my kids lost their little tablet computers.  Serves ‘em right for paying so much attention to them and obsessing over them.  The thing the irked me the most was when my daughter would be on this kids version of YouTube.  The only thing she would watch was videos of moms and girls playing with dolls.  These videos were made my women who were paid money by toy companies to open toy boxes and play with the toys on camera exclusively for the purpose of posting it on the internet.  My daughter could not understand this socioeconomic concept or method of advertising.  When failing to explain to her how the scam worked, I would usually break down, cry, and scream “WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU WATCHING VIDEOS OF OTHER PEOPLE PLAYING WITH TOYS?!  GET THE FUCK UPSTAIRS AND PLAY WITH YOUR TOYS!!!”  As you can tell, we have a lot of deep, meaningful, philosophical conversations.  Adults, I am not letting you off the hook here, either.  Unless you are watching a tutorial, there is no… NO reason why grown men should be watching videos on the internet of other people playing video games.  I’m talking to you, person 3 desks away from me.  Just because some kid created a Super Mario World level that is difficult doesn’t mean you should watch a video of him fail to finish the level.  Go home and play the game yourself.

If you work in the field of quality control and are looking for a good laugh, I highly recommend reading the parody document “DUMB AS9100”.  It is a parody of the aerospace quality standard AS9100.  Do a google search and you should find it.