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Gathering around the table. √
Spending some quality time together. √
Taking a break from DVDs, movies, video games and other passive forms of entertainment. √
Reliving fond memories of playing Monopoly as a kid. √
Trying to figure out which version of Monopoly to play. √
Watching the kids fight over who gets to be the racecar. √
Watching the kids fight over who gets to roll first. √
Watching the kids fight over who who the bowl of popcorn gets to be set down in front of. √
Threatening to send everyone to bed if they don’t behave. √
Enjoying five minutes of stress-free game play. √
Trying to explain to a younger sibling why they have to give their older sibling money just because they landed on Marvin Gardens. √
Wiping away the younger sibling’s tears. √
Using the parent voice to tell the older sibling not to be a sore winner. √
Getting competitive. √
Mentally adding up the cost of therapy if you decide to just completely bankrupt your kids. √
Reminding yourself the point is to have fun. √
Letting your kids win. √
Hoping Family Game Night will be better next week. √
Fearing that it won’t. √
Wondering if Family Movie Night would be a better idea instead. √
Things we want but don’t need:
- More choices
- The complete season of anything
- Bigger HDTVs
- New neighbors (they don’t say “The devil you know…” for nothing)
- Sleep (though it might not feel that way today, the fact that our eyes are still open proves it)
Things we need but don’t have:
- Time
- Enough space in the hall closet
- Healthy, all-natural, organic snacks that don’t taste like crap
- Somebody to validate our decisions
- Perspective (which, like car keys and DVD cases, is easy to misplace and doesn’t usually turn up until we stop looking for it)
Things we have but don’t use:
- Offers from childless friends to baby-sit
- Half of whatever we got at our school’s last silent auction
- A fondue set
- Kid coupons for “15 minutes of quiet,” “a free back rub,” “breakfast in bed,” etc.
- Control over what we do with our life (even though it doesn’t always — or ever? — feel that way)
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With a single Thanksgiving meal packing a full day-and-half’s worth of calories, it’s easy to see why so many of us find ourselves slumped on the sofa in front of the TV after everyone has gone home, groaning, bloated, unable to move and wondering why we feel so bad.
Fortunately, there is a simple way to prevent this kind of excess on Thanksgiving: go vegan.
While many can’t imagine Thanksgiving without turkey, gravy and sausage-based stuffing, that’s the whole point: if you fill your table with stuff you don’t like and normally wouldn’t ever eat, you can’t possibly eat too much.
True, nut roll, tempeh and all-the-vegetables-you-can-eat might not sound very appealing to some, but keep in mind that you can still booze it up.
(And while that, too, may leave you slumped on the sofa in front of the TV after everyone has gone home, you won’t be groaning, bloated, unable to move and wondering why you feel so bad, you’ll just be passed out).
Gobble. Gobble. Gobble.
Editor’s note: What if you’re already vegan? Do just the opposite: go un-vegan. Not only will the shock of all that animal flesh make you instantly sick — and therefore unable to overeat — throwing up at the table will also help your friends and family because the sight, sound and smell of your vomit will likely cause them to vomit, too, and then nobody will be able to eat, let alone overeat.
KID: Look at me. I have a beard!
PARENT: Wow. You do have a beard. You look like Grizzly Adams.
KID: I made it myself.
PARENT: I can see that. It looks like… Hold on… Come closer so I can get a better look.
KID: I did a good job, didn’t I?
PARENT: You didn’t use the permanent markers from my drawer, did you?
KID: I did — but it’s okay because when I was done I didn’t leave them out, I put them right back where I found them.
Everybody makes fun of Driver’s License photographs, but how good could anyone look after spending three hours and 19 minutes at a place like the DMV?
The walls are painted a government-approved shade of beige that seems to have been chosen for its ability to induce nausea. God only knows what kind of deadly germs and pathogens are breeding freely on the furniture (which looks like it was bought on the cheap at a Nixon Administration yard sale and then left in a basement storage room for three decades). And if you think tinnitus is irritating, it’s a lullaby compared to the hum given off by row after row of cheap fluorescent lights.
Still, that would all be tolerable if you could just take a number and wait by yourself.
But you can’t.
If you’ve ever wondered what the people on “Cops” do when they’re not getting arrested, or what somebody who considers personal hygiene to be optional looks like, all you have to do is turn to either side of you and say “hello.”
Clearly, somebody has been peeing in the gene pool.
How else can you explain the toothless, tattooed biker chick/meth addict taking the motorcycle test who doesn’t see the problem with asking the proctor if he can give her a hint? Or the old lady renewing her license who insists she doesn’t need a vision test, but then can’t even find the line she’s supposed to stand behind to take it? Or the guy at the center of a booze-cloud you can smell from 20 feet away who gets upset because they won’t let him re-take his driver’s test right now?
As bad as it is to be near people like this, however, it’s a whole lot worse when you realize you’re no different than people like this – because when you get up to the window and the clerk says you need two additional pieces of ID, not one like you thought, you protest…
And say nobody told you…
And say you’ve been waiting all morning already…
And say that they should make an exception…
And say the rules are stupid…
And say they are stupid for enforcing them…
And say just about every idiotic thing you can think of, until you finally realize you are saying every idiotic thing you can think of.
At which point you go home, get another ID, and wait in line all over again.
And then they take your picture.
Click.
Oprah and Sarah Palin sitting down together? Isn’t that like matter sitting down with anti-matter?
And isn’t that supposed to make the universe explode?
Since we’re all still here, it must have gone reasonably well. Which raises the question: what will they do next?
First, of course, Oprah will have to call The White House to explain why she gave millions of dollars in free publicity to President Obama’s 2012 opponent, and Sarah will have to call Rush Limbaugh (or Glenn Beck) to explain why she gave a guaranteed ratings bump to a liberal.
But after that?
While they could just go their separate ways, both are shrewd enough to realize that between the two of them they appeal to 94% of the U.S. population, and would therefore be unbeatable at the polls.
True, they do have philosophical differences, but they also have Dr. Phil to help them work those out.
(And if he couldn’t help, they could sit down with Hillary for a little advice on how to get along with somebody you don’t always agree with.)
Absurd? Sure, but what aspect of politics isn’t? And think of all the advantages they’d have:
- Both are comfortable on camera.
- Both speak their mind.
- Both are wealthy enough to self-finance their campaign.
- Oprah knows where Africa is.
There is one sticking point: who’d be the candidate and who’d be the running mate?
Which brings up the following poll:
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- Showering.
- Getting dressed in the morning.
- Punctuality.
- Watching a TV show all the way through in one sitting.
- Airport security checkpoints.
- Walking through the house without tripping over a toy (or a toddler).
- Talking on the phone.
- Going to the toilet by yourself.
- Peace and quiet.
- Driving anywhere more than 15 minutes away.
- Scheduling.
- Maintaining order.
- Arguing with your spouse. (Especially because swear words tend to get re- peated over and over by the little ears that hear them.)
- Dinner (because they want to help make it and/or because they hate every- thing you suggest).
- Administering oral medications.
- Keeping your shoes in order on the floor of your walk-in closet.
- Logic and reason.
- Staying in bed all day when you’re sick.
- Keeping food off your clothes.
- Keeping make-up in the top drawer of the vanity.
- Vacuuming.
- Sex. (Which you’re probably too tired to want, anyway.)
- Talking to other adults like they’re adults.
- Working from home.
- Writing anything longer than a list.
1.
PARENTS: Hi, we’re X’s parents. You must be… Hey, you don’t look so good!
TEACHER: I just need to sit down.
PARENTS: Are you alright? Should we call the school nurse or something?
TEACHER: No, I just get nauseous whenever I hear your child’s name.
2.
PARENTS: Hi, we’re X’s parents.
TEACHER: Who?
PARENTS: X?!?!?!
TEACHER: Are you sure he’s in my class?
PARENTS: He sits right here, right in front of you.
TEACHER: I guess he hasn’t made much of an impression on me, but why don’t you have a seat anyway.
3.
PARENTS: Hi, we’re X’s parents.
TEACHER: Glad you could make it. Now, if you’ll just follow me, the principal wants to talk with you as well.
4.
PARENTS: Hi, we’re X’s parents.
TEACHER: Nice to meet you.
PARENTS: And this is our lawyer, Gloria Allred.
5.
PARENTS: Hi, we’re X‘s parents.
TEACHER: Yes, he talks about you a lot.
PARENTS: That’s good.
TEACHER: …with the school psychologist.
PARENTS: Oh.
HUSBAND: Hey.
WIFE: Back already?
HUSBAND: Yeah, traffic wasn’t too bad.
WIFE: Did you get eggs?
HUSBAND: Yup.
WIFE: Toilet paper?
HUSBAND: I knew there was something I forgot.
WIFE: That’s okay, I’ll just get it when I take the kids to piano.
HUSBAND: Or I can get it when I take ‘em to karate?
WIFE: Or I can… er… uh… I was gonna say I can get it when I take ‘em to swimming, but I have to stop at the drug store.
HUSBAND: If you do, will you pick me up some shaving cream?
WIFE: Sure, but I thought you used an electric… Hey! When did you grow a beard?
HUSBAND: June.
WIFE: Really?
HUSBAND: Yeah, when we were finally getting around to making our New Year’s Resolutions. You said “I’m gonna change my hair color to red!”
WIFE: I did.
HUSBAND: And I said “I’m gonna grow a beard.” Wait. You did?
WIFE: Like it?
HUSBAND: How could I have missed something like that?
BOTH: We’ve got to make time for each other.
WIFE: Let’s check our schedules. December is bad. How’s January look for you?
HUSBAND: Crazy. February?
WIFE: No, we’ll be getting ready for Spring Break. April?
HUSBAND: How about Thursday the 8th?
WIFE: Monday the 12th would be better.
HUSBAND: How about 7:00 to 8:15?
WIFE: AM or PM?
Our legal system guarantees the accused a fair and speedy trial, proof of guilt “beyond reasonable doubt” and punishment that isn’t “cruel or unusual.” Fortunately, these same rights don’t extend to children — something every parent who’s ever come home stressed, worried, angry or anxious about something else and just exploded at their kids can take comfort in.
(As if parenting wasn’t hard enough, just imagine what it would be like if you had to be fair and reasonable every minute of every day.)
In light of that, a short, incomplete list of crimes, punishments and the real reason behind them:
Crime: Cheetos
Punishment: brown rice, tofu and vegetables for dinner every night for the rest of the month
Real reason: mom started a new diet, has somehow gained 3.5 pounds
Crime: putting hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place just before dad lands on it
Punishment: game over, everybody sent to bed
Real reason: one of dad’s fraternity brothers just made the Forbes 400
Crime: putting hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place just before dad lands on it
Punishment: game over, everybody sent to bed, dad sits in living room drink- ing whiskey
Real reason: one of dad’s brothers just made the Forbes 400
Crime: acting like a 4-year-old
Punishment: no more Chuck E. Cheese’s, ever
Real reason: as if an hour at Chuck E. Cheese’s wasn’t bad enough, you’ve now been there for three
Crime: one sibling violates another’s personal space by “not touching”
Punishment: turn car around, go home
Real reason: dad just got the taxes back from the accountant, who said “child care” wasn’t deductible
Crime: answering the phone
Punishment: fined $50
Real reason: it’s fundraising season and charities are exempt from the “Do Not Call” registry
Crime: leaving a single cookie crumb on the kitchen counter
Punishment: helping clean the entire house from top to bottom, including the back yard
Real reason: mother-in-law coming, will mentally perform “white glove test” the second she arrives
Crime: getting out dad’s “Stripes” DVD
Punishment: no TV for the rest of the week
Real reason: it’s not really a “Stripes” DVD (wink, wink, nudge, nudge)
Crime: missing the toilet
Punishment: a good talking-to
Real reason: mom and dad spent the day cleaning up somebody else’s mess at work, just can’t handle doing it at home right now
Crime: not finishing food
Punishment: 20-minute lecture on how food costs a lot of money that we can’t afford to be wasting right now
Real reason: employment figures released, stocks plunged, housing market dropped even lower, etc.
- Even if you are the first person in line, first thing in the morning, you will end up waiting an hour and a half.
- Anything that can be screwed up will be screwed up.
- Just because you are half-blind, senile, psychotic or drunk doesn’t mean you can’t renew your license — though if you’re half-blind you’ll have to take the vision test.
- The fact that you’re supposed to take a number when you walk in only confuses the people in front of you who never learned to count.
- Instructions are in Albanian, Arabic, Bosnian, Cambodian, Chinese, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Korean, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Somalian, Spanish, Turkish, Thai and Vietnamese, but stupidity seems to be the same in any language.
- If your car gets stolen, it is likely the person who stole it is waiting in line in front of you.
- Saying you “work at the DMV” is kind of misleading – a more accurate description would be to say you “do as little work as you possibly can so you don’t get fired from the DMV.”
- No matter how fat you are, there will be a woman ahead of you who weighs at least 100 pounds more than you do. (This may be the one positive thing about the DMV.)
- One couple waiting in line will get into a huge, screaming argument.
- One couple waiting in line will dry hump each other until a DMV employee asks them to stop.
- Somebody will video this couple and post it on Youtube.
- If you think a set of instructions are so simple even a moron could follow them, the moron in line in front of you will prove you wrong, and require up to 25 minutes of redundant, repetitive picture-based explanation before he or she realizes you can’t just take the driver’s test and get a license, you must actually pass it first.
- If you accidentally marked “A” even though you know the answer is “None of the above,” you still have to re-take the test.
- If the fee is $25 and you only have $23, you are $2 short no matter how many times you say “Please” or “Couldn’t you just cut me a little slack?”
- Even if there are 50 open seats, somebody will sit down right next to you.
- The person who sits down next to you will make you consider leaving and coming back tomorrow, even if you have already waited two hours and are next in line.
If it’s the cleaning lady’s job to clean the house, why do we always pick up before she comes?
(Usually just before she comes, too, with one of the kids stalling her in the foyer as we scramble to de-clutter the upstairs.)
It would be one thing if we were motivated by conscience, believing it unfair to have her clean everything, but this doesn’t seem to be the case. Are we worried she’ll realize we’re really just a family of slobs?
She can probably tell that already, thanks to dishes that occasionally end up under the bed and the collection of crumbs, coins and God-knows-what-it-is she regularly unearths from beneath the sofa cushions.
Do we think she’ll tell the H.O.A. how much more disgusting our house is than, say, the neighbor’s down the street?
(It is, but only because they have no kids.)
Or do we just not want anyone — even the cleaning lady — to find out how much of our lifestyle is an illusion, and that the only parts we have the energy to maintain week in, week out, are the ones that other people see?
(And if this is the case, is it a valid reason to switch to a cleaning service that relies on a small, anonymous army that moves too quickly for any one that’s a part of it to form any kind of impression of what a stye the house usually is?)
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- What do you do if you just don’t get it?
- Does that mean you’re hopelessly out of touch?
- Or that you have better things to do?
- If you do sign up now, doesn’t that mean the whole thing is that much closer to being uncool? And that everybody under 25 is already moving on to something else?
- What if you sign up and nobody wants to be your friend?
- What if you sign up and nobody wants to be your friend except people you don’t want to be friends with?
- If somebody invites you to be their friend but you have no idea who they are, should you still accept?
- And if you don’t accept, should you explain why?
- Will they hate you?
- If somebody doesn’t accept your friend request, should you take it personally?
- If you do take it personally even though you haven’t talked to the person in 10 or 15 years, is that strange?
- What if your boss wants to be your friend?
- Or your creepy neighbor?
- Or the person who got drunk at the last neighborhood block party and tried to hit on you?
- If you sign your parents up because you think they will get a kick out of it but then they start posting updates you find embarrassing, stupid or just a huge waste of time, will they cut you out of their will if you unfriend them?
- If you run into somebody you’ve unfriended at the supermarket, do you have to ignore them?
- Will they ignore you?
- When you create your profile, should you make it public or private?
- If it’s public, how much personal information should you share?
- If it’s private, how much personal information is too much personal information?
- Can you exaggerate?
- Is everybody else exaggerating?
- If you look at the photos of your friends from high school to see if they are fatter than you are before including your own photo, does that make you a shallow person?
- If you look at the photos of your friends from high school to see if they are fatter than you are before photoshopping your own photo, does that make you a bad person?
- If you don’t post very often, will your friends think you’re just too boring?
- If you post all the time, will your friends think you’re just too bored?
- What if your updates are stupid?
- What if your updates are pointless?
- What if your updates are way too long and personal?
- What if nobody ever responds to your posts? Ever? Does that mean you’re a loser?
- Or just offline?
- What if you just don’t want to tell everyone what you’re doing?
- If you are pissed off about something and/or drunk and you respond to a friend’s post with an update that’s mean-spirited or cruel, can you just send them an e-mail to say you’re sorry?
- Or do you have to make the apology public, too?
- Where does it all end?
- If you reluctantly sign up for Facebook, how long before you then have to sign up for Twitter?
- And if have no time for Facebook updates, how are you going to find time to tweet?
- What is a tweet, anyway?
- At what point does all this social networking become too much for anyone to keep up with?
- Have we reached that point already?
- And if we have, could somebody please go to Facebook or Twitter and say so?
Everybody draws a blank sometimes, especially tired, distracted, frustrated parents. So what do you do when you need a threat but just can’t think of one? Click the box below to randomly generate a generic threat that should work for just about any occasion.
| Threat: |
Do that one more time and I'll switch the TV in your room back to basic cable. | |
To generate other responses, just click the bold text in the box above.
HUSBAND: What are you doing?
WIFE: Watching TV.
HUSBAND: I can see that, but why aren’t you watching in HD?
WIFE: Do we get this channel in HD?
HUSBAND: Of course! Don’t you remember the expanded super-premium top tier all-access HD cable package I told you about?
WIFE: No.
HUSBAND: Let me show you: this is what you were watching… and this is the same channel in HD.
WIFE: What’s the difference?
HUSBAND: What’s the difference?!?!?!?
WIFE: Besides the extra $1000 you spent on the really, really big screen, instead of putting it into the college fund.
HUSBAND: It’s not just the size. Can’t you see how much better the resolution is? This is a 720p HD signal on a 1080p monitor, not that up-converted 480i crap you were watching.
WIFE: I don’t even know what you’re saying. Can’t I just want to watch the show?
HUSBAND: I don’t know why I even bother trying to explain this stuff.
WIFE: I don’t know why you even think I’d care. But while you’re standing there, go into the closet and grab my gray cashmere sweater, will you?
HUSBAND: Fine. Here.
WIFE: I said “gray cashmere.”
HUSBAND: That’s what this is.
WIFE: It’s not gray, it’s charcoal.
HUSBAND: Huh?
WIFE: And it’s not cashmere, it’s wool.
HUSBAND: What’s the difference?
- More people are worried about H1N1 than will ever contract H1N1.
- No matter how often you wash your hands, avoid public places and keep six feet from anyone who looks sick, somebody you know won’t, and that’s who you’ll catch it from.
- The same health experts who remind us that H1N1 isn’t really that much worse than the regular seasonal flu remind us that the regular seasonal flu kills 36,000 every year, so we should still get vaccinated.
- None of which matters since there’s no vaccine right now anyway.
- That said, if you’re one of those people who won’t get the vaccine when it’s available because you think it will give you the flu, you won’t get the shot and you won’t get the flu.
- If you’re one of those people who thinks that people who won’t get the shot because they think it will give them the flu are stupid, you’ll get the shot and you’ll get the flu, confirming their suspicions. (Though you won’t have contracted H1N1 from the vaccine, you’ll have gotten it from the person in front of you at the flu shot line.)
- This is an actual recommendation for preventing the spread of H1N1: “If you do have swine flu, do your best to stay out of the emergency room, doctor’s office or urgent-care center.” So where are sick people supposed to go? (Besides — depending on their politics — their Congressperson’s office or the lobby of their health insurance provider.)
- There is one benefit to H1N1: employers are actually encouraging employees to stay home if they’re not feeling well, which is particularly good to know given the fact that the symptoms of H1N1 are exactly the same as a bad hangover, and the holidays are coming up.
- Given how freaked out people are about H1N1, you’d think you could get infected just by reading about it.
- On the other hand, nobody has said you can’t.
The end.
KID: What’s Daylight Savings?
PARENT: It’s when we set our clocks back an hour.
KID: What does that mean?
PARENT: It means what used to be 10:00 is now 9:00, so there’s actually an extra hour in the day.
KID: Which day?
PARENT: Today.
KID: That’s a relief – I was afraid it was gonna be when I was in school.
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