You know how people say, “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?” I don’t like picking on people my own size because they can potentially make me look stupid with witty retorts, and can in almost every case out-violent me if it comes down to that.
This is why picking on a child is ideal. They aren’t smart enough to out wit you, and if they try to hurt you it’s really easy to just knock ’em down. KO in the first round. (Just for the record, that scratch on Maria’s head wasn’t caused by me. Purely coincidental.)
Case in point:
Christmas Eve 2010. Maria, age 4. Evil plate at dinner, full of … food. Tears and tears abound.
Sorry for the blurred picture. I was laughing pretty heartily.
She was “too full” to finish her corn. Adrian said, “OK then, would you like dessert?”
Maria stopped crying, looked up hopefully and said “Yes, please!”
Adrian: “You’re obviously not full then. Finish your corn.”
WAAAAAGHGHHH!!!!
I couldn’t stop laughing.
Her mum said she couldn’t have any Christmas presents if she didn’t finish the corn, so this left Maria in a bit of a pickle. She could eat the corn and let us win, or she could “win” and not eat the corn, but then she wouldn’t get any presents.
After another ten minutes or so of crying and whining Adrian and I, the evil couple that we are, thought it would be hilarious to pretend to let her win. We’d say, “OK, it’s Christmastime. In the morning you can open your presents.” The next morning she’d open the beautifully wrapped box, eyes wide with excitement, and find nothing but the leftover plate of corn sitting inside. Oh, the look of her shattered heart right before she’d burst into tears would be priceless.
We didn’t do it, though. Her mum thought it would be too mean although she laughed at the thought as well.
Her mum refrigerated the corn because Maria agreed to eat it the next morning, and she did with no complaints. She was really good and ended up opening all her presents and parading around in her princess dresses.
lemony snippet 
“Princess” dresses fill me with RAGE!!!!!1!!11!!!
I am already too old when it comes to kids. All I can think of is how their minds are being addled by outrageous consumerism, famewhores, and feelings of entitlement. When I was a kid, I hardly ever got anything I really wanted; I got what we could afford and it ended up being fine. I had a phase where I bought anything I wanted, then felt the pain of crushing debt.
I could say I want others to feel that too, but they’re probably going to have it much worse in the end and that satisfies me enough to pretend to be a good person around kids.
I understand about the princess culture and things like Bratz bother me a bit, but at the same time I had princess dresses that my grandma made me and I turned out fine. Maria likes her dresses but she also likes “boy” stuff as well, and she is in no way spoiled.
Corn was one of my favorite foods as a kid so this never would have been a problem. Broccoli, on the other hand, was the devil in vegetable form. Was never bribed with princess dresses as I was able to make my own costume. One pillow case and flowing, permed hair and I was The Little Mermaid. Or just a topless freak with a pillow case binding my legs.
Ha ha! “topless freak with a pillow case binding my legs.” That reminds me of the time my sister and I tried to play Forrest Gump, and she put on my dad’s jeans and tied them up so she’d look like Lt Dan with no legs.
Bwah hahhaha! That’s so something I would do. One particularly bad year when the girls were little and driving me insane in the build up to Christmas, I hid all their presents in the laundry room and left a note from Santa telling them how disappointed he was in their behavior. I was almost impossible to hold in the giggles as they apologized up the chimney. (They got their presents after that!)
That’s so funny! I’d have been laughing so hard! Now that my actions (or would-be actions) have been endorsed by another mom I’ll take it that I’m not evil. Or maybe we’re both evil. Either way it’s funny 🙂
I don’t believe the scratch is coincidental. You beat her up didn’t you?! 🙂
My husband is really, really sarcastic with little kids, so it should be funny to see what sort of tricks he’ll come up with once we have our own. I could see him actually wrapping up the corn or telling her that if she didn’t eat it, Santa was going to come back and take all of her presents and deliver them to all the kids that DID eat their corn. Unfortunately, this sort of thing only works while they’re still pretty young. Then they discover that you’re lying:/
Ha! Yeah, my dad used to play tricks on me. One time he convinced me he had X-ray glasses and could see through walls. I was so excited about how cool that was.I even tested him by looking out the mail slot and asking what cars were out front. Obviously he knew since he parked there every day. I was like WOW and I told my mom as soon as she got home and she set things straight. I wonder how long I would have believed.
Too funny! I’m a fourth grade teacher and I think of things every day I could do…like accidentally tripping a child after he comes to my desk for the gazillionth time. Fun post! Vickie
Ha ha thanks! I bet you have a TON of funny stories from the classroom!