My Wife is Better Than Me

My Wife is Better Than Me

When it comes to parenting, I don’t buy into gender stereotypes or biological imperatives or how they feel on “Mad Men”.

It’s 2015! Parenting tasks are no longer divided solely by gender, at least not in my house. It’s a team effort, a total 50/50 proposition, and moms and dads both have to go all-in to make it work.

That said, there are definitely some things my wife does better than me, and most of them aren’t gender-specific. (Unless you count being sick. Women totally dominate there.)

She had her birthday last week, so I thought I’d share a few of them. Better late than never!

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What Parents Need

What Parents Need

Yesterday, in advance of Mom and Buried’s upcoming sprinkle, I wrote a list of things I want for baby number two.

Some of them are ridiculous, completely unattainable fantasies, but aside from the booze – and the vasectomy(!) – pretty much all of them were for the baby.

Now that that’s over with, today I’m focusing on what parents need.

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Baby Item Wish List

Baby Item Wish List

My wife’s friends are throwing her a sprinkle, which is both the name of a smaller, not-your-first-kid baby shower and a word I will spend the rest of my life trying to avoid saying.

As one does when generous friends plan to ease the stress and expense of preparing for a major life-changing event, my wife has started a registry. I have not seen this registry, and I may never see it. I may even be fabricating the fact that she even started one. I haven’t been paying attention.

Regardless, I decided to write a baby item wish list of things I think we need for baby #2, some of which are obvious, some of which are outlandish, and a few of which don’t actually exist.

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Counter Programming

Counter Programming

We ration our son’s screen time.

At this point, he only plays a handful of tablet games, so “screen time” is still mostly “TV watching time,” and we try to limit it. If he’s going to become a couch potato, it’s at least going to be when he’s old enough to watch legitimate programming. There’s no need to binge watch “Dinotrux”.

Of course, sometimes we need him to watch something, just to get him out of our hair. And one of the joys of TV in 2015 is the ability to stream shows whenever we want. We’re not slaves to the programming schedule. But we are slaves to our kid.

So if we need to get something done, we’ll throw on Netflix and let him go to town. (But not “The Town.” He’s too young for that much Affleck.)
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Take This Under Advisement, Jerkweed! – Volume 12

Take This Under Advisement, Jerkweed! – Volume 12

Nobody wants my advice much these days. even though a highly respected and totally anonymous website I’ve never heard of just called me a cross between Louis C.K. and Homer Simpson, which may or may not be a compliment?

I used to run these columns fairly regularly, but now, even when I bang the drum for questions, I hardly get enough to fill the space. Which is a shame, because my advice is not only terrible and potentially damaging, it’s funny and potentially damaging. But without questions, I can offer no answers.

Thus, this may be the last edition of Parental Advisories. You have only yourselves to blame.

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