Nuclear Family Meltdown

I like children on principle. They are like small people in the throes of a really good acid trip and haven't yet learned how to properly be assholes. Most of them.  I have met my share of very advanced students, however, such as the two I had to deal with yesterday. And how does a child learn how to be an asshole before they learn their ABC's and how to tie their shoes? From their asshole parents of course. And how big an asshole would you have to be for that to be the dominant character trait that you telegraph to your offspring before you teach them to say please and thank you? The kind of asshole that would rather let an iPad interact with their child so they don't have to. 

"hush now,meatpuppet. I will console you."

There is no surer indication of an inadequate parent than the presence of an iPad on the table. If you have brought a child up that doesn't have the self control to sit through one meal without a t.v. screen in their face with a cartoon animal singing a creepy little song then you are a failure of a parent. Yay for you, you have increased the number of idiots on a planet that is already chock full of idiots. Good job, asshole. When are you going to get around to teaching the kid how to behave? After softball season is over? How about RIGHT THE *%#CK NOW? 

Here is the situation: I go to greet a table that I can already hear from the other side of the bar. It's a little family of four, two little loin monsters and Mom and Dad- the Nuclear Family. The little Princess is raising hell about something, Mom is struggling to get the iPad propped up and get some cartoon distraction going before this little creature sets fire to the restaurant. Dad is just glaring at everybody,looking for something to kill. Little Boy Loinmonster is getting down to the business of wrecking the table. The sugar caddy has done something very bad and he is making it pay for its crimes. They've been sitting there for about 90 seconds and the table next to them is already looking around uncomfortably and wondering if it's too late to get another table.

When I reluctantly go over there Dad immediately starts snapping at me, as if it's my fault he doesn't know how to pull out early.He's raising his voice to be heard above the howls of his monster children and demands that I get them some food NOW. They will settle down once they get food he says. 

OR you could make them settle down by parenting them. Just a thought. Take the energy that you put into buying the iPad and put it into some interaction with them, set some boundaries, expectations, punishment/ reward system. Put them in the Skinner box. 

Here is one of the Ten Commandments of Restaurants:

If your kids are raising hell before you even sit down to eat, do NOT rush to get them food. Rush to get them back in the car before everyone in the restaurant wills your gonads to shrivel up before you spawn any more monsters. 

what do you mean you're pregnant? How did  THAT happen?!

In a more civilised age people used to wall up their mistakes in wine cellars, or if they were kind they put them in the attic and fed them under the door. They didn't take them out to dinner.