TV is full of vitamins

Dinner announcement in my house is met with :
Neel : What’s for dinner?
Me : Well, there is….
Neel : Why ?
Nik : I doesn’t like it.

I am quite aware that I need to start dinner etiquette early in life, and am very impressed by pictures of kids sitting at table, elbows off the table, with greens on their plate. Greens !

The problems with this picture :
1) Anything green is pulled out of the mouth along with more green slime from the inner depths of the mouth cavity, and flung at the other kid’s plate.
2) Elbows are never off the table. In fact, sometimes the whole shoulder too, and a chin, and a knee follow.
3) The table itself is a miracle. I started out with all kids strapped in high chairs, at the table. As soon as they could crawl, they crawled out of the strapped high chair, displaying dexterity that Houdini would give his left elbow for.

So dinner now consists of me chasing Niks around the house, under the sofa, with a piece of roti in my hand, threatening him with fire and brimstone forever and ever. While Neel sits with his plate in front of him and whines : Why can’t I run around and eat too?

If all else fails, I turn to my always-present, always-helpful baby-sitter.
TV.
So while Ben 10’s many-legged alien spouts green goo at some unfortunate, the little eyes watching open wide, and the little mouth opens wider, and in goes the piece of roti.

Doctors who say never feed your kids in front of TV, never said this in front of their wives.
Cos wives/ mothers all know TV is terrific for our kids. It is the source of Tom and Jerry, Vitamins and Minerals. Dora, the Explorer = a slice of carrot, Spiderman = a spoon of sprouts.

WoMandatory

This is in heated defence of what S calls the advantage of being a male – “you don’t have to carry a bag of useful things around.”

Dip-bag research held immediately.
Results :

- 93% of women friends carry a Biiig bag to put all the things that might be needed. Like a hockey stick – hey, you never know when you’d need that. My Ma has never thrown out anything since 1960 because she’s convinced we will all need that some day.
- 10% of women carry photographs of old boyfriends UNDER the picture of their husband.
- 30% of women carry a pair of running shoes, since they wear thigh-twistingly high heels to look taller than their Boss
- 82 % of women carry tissues, in case they go for a movie, and in case the movie is sad, and in case they cry, and in case they have no man’s shirt nearby to wipe their noses on.
- 3 % of women carry money for impulse shopping. The other 97% do NO impulse shopping (that they can’t buy on their card). 96% of these carry their ‘joint account’ card. Ahem!
- 57% of women carry chocolates/ candies/ gum/ roasted pork chops with burnt sauce – in their bags in case hunger pangs hit.
- 35% percent carry safety pins to “accidentally” jab viciously into that man in the bus who “accidentally” falls on them. The others carry more dangerous weapons.
- Many percent carry lipsticks, perfumes, sunscreen, mascara – and a spare toothbrush.
- 45% of women carry age-proof that proves they are 15 years younger than they actually are.
- Zero percent of women carry anything “useful” if it doesn’t look expensive or make them look expensive.

Dip-stick research carried out on men friends as to what they’d carry if they had to carry a big bag – turned out responses like “But Why?” or "Why Me?" , and were invalidated.

Note : Nowadays, women in fashion magazines are not seen with a big bag, but something called a ‘clutch’ – which is the size of a post card, and as slim. These are not ‘real women’ but cut-outs of paper, that weigh as much, and are born without things such as brains and ‘hunger pangs’ – both needed to adequately fill that big bag.

An Easter Story

No hot cross buns? NO HOT CROSS BUNS ?
I stomped and the waiter at Daily Bread squirmed.
Today is Good Friday. Once a year, on one day, there are hot cross buns. And you say there are NO HOT CROSS BUNS ? I mean I wait 364 days a year for a day on which I’m fasting to eat these buns !
The waiter promised me he would get them, go to his HQ, go to the bakery, short of making his grand-mom bake them, he promised me everything. At 6 that evening, they would be ready.

At 6.05, I was at Daily Bread, with my 2 lil boys in tow.
No hot cross buns? AGAIN ? YOU PROMISED ME !!!
My voice rising like the tide, I unleashed a whole speech on my Easter season being ruined, and my little boys dying of disappointment (though they did a dismal job of being dead, since they were chasing each other around the trays of cakes, oblivious to their supposed disappointment.)

Suddenly, the waiter was called to another table, and came back with a huge box. It had 4 hot cross buns in it.
I thought you said there were none left? I hollered.
The waiter gestured at the table in the corner where a lady sat sipping coffee with her 11-year-old son. They ordered it, said the waiter, but they’re giving theirs to you. For your boys.

If Easter is about hope, and kindness and empathy, I think that lady gave her son a much stronger Easter lesson than I gave my boys that day.