Dear Futurething,
My wife told me to add this to the diary.
Sincerely,
B. Thomas Watkins, Esq.
31 Flavors of Things Not to Do with Our Baby
by Brandi Besalki
1. Babies don't shake so good. They have shit for spines. Don't shake the baby.
2. Newborns can't digest Brussels sprouts. Blended or otherwise. I won't bend on this, so don't try it.
3. Don't give it milk without testing the milk on your wrist. Come to think of it, you're a stone-skinned, nerve-damaged Golem. Don't feed our baby.
4. The baby powder is for the baby. If you're good, I'll give you one of the empty bottles to play with.
5. No baby talk. None. And no baby talking to defy me for telling you not to baby talk.
6. Don't pretend you can understand our baby's gurgling and then tell me it told you it wished I'd shave my legs more often.
7. Don't shave the baby.
8. Don't try to indoctrinate our child to like the things you like. Let it develop its own aesthetic system. It may choose to like some of the things you like, but it won't choose to like all the things you like. This is good. This is healthy. Don't be surprised if Silver Spoons isn't one of the things it chooses to like.
9. Remember how the first time you held your step-niece you mimed rapping on its forehead with your knuckles, then you made that accompanying clicking noise to suggest that the sound of your rapping was bouncing off the inside walls of your step-niece's skull? Remember how your stepsister then took your step-niece away and said, "Ha ha. Very funny, Beau." IT. WASN'T.
10. You're better than your daily "Modest Proposal" references. Stop making them. They make people uncomfortable. Not because they're worried you'll eat the baby, but because they're embarrassed for me.
11. Our baby is not a doorstop.
12. You are not allowed to refer to the baby's nose as a "resonating chamber." You are absolutely not allowed to refer to it as "The Resonator."
13. Don't think I don't know what you're thinking every time you compare the length and girth of a baby's limbs to that of an erect penis. No condoms on the baby.
14. It's good that you've come to the early realization that it is unreasonable to expect our child to be some kind of prodigy. I hate listening to parents brag about their supposed super genius toddlers just as much as the next person. That said, I'd appreciate it if you'd quit telling people just how unimportant and unspectacular you expect our baby to grow up to be. The vigor and enthusiasm with which you do this is unsettling.
15. Don't "Mama Bird" food into the baby's mouth. Alicia Silverstone is an idiot. I know you agree with me on this point, but I don't put it past you to follow her lead for comedy's sake.
16. Irony Parenting is out. Don't dress our baby up like a hipster to make fun of hipsters, don't buy our baby a cell phone, don't sew our baby a three-piece, double-breasted suit and parade it around while wearing an adult diaper, don't rhinestone the car seat, etc.
17. Don't tell our baby my name is "Homer."
18. No guerrilla circumcisions. I don't care if you two don't "match." This goes for either gender.
19. Don't tell our baby that it's boring. Yes, it's boring. It doesn't know shit. It will probably continue to be boring until it is five-ish. That's just the way of things. Sorry.
20. Don't tell our baby "Dead Baby" jokes. No, not even that one.
21. No PhotoShopping boobs on our baby. No PhotoShopping the baby, period.
22. I'd better not catch you trying to make "Shit, Negro! That's all you had to say!" our child's first words. Our child is not a parrot. Our child is not Samuel L. Jackson.
23. Our baby's first word will probably be "look," "ma," "da," "ouch," or something equally mundane. There's a good chance it won't be a real word, and that we will twist the sound to mean something we want it to mean. It's probably best if you leave it up to me to figure out what the baby said.
24. No Sharpie-ing a Hitler mustache on the baby. No one buys the "It's the Charlie Chaplin!" excuse. Ditto the "It's the Oliver Hardy!" excuse.
25. No more jokes about masturbating the baby. They're not funny. You're not funny.
26. This should go without saying, but I realize I married a man-child, so: no masturbating the baby.
27. Our baby is not a bowling ball. What do we do with things that aren't bowling balls? We keep them out of bowling ball bags. That's what. Speaking of which, it's not like you even bowl. Sell the damned bag.
28. Here's a preemptive strike against you sewing angel wings on the backs of our kid's Onesies: no sewing angel wings on the backs of our kid's Onesies. It's pretty clear you intend to use them as proxy bowling ball bag handles.
29. You have sung the Silver Spoons theme song for the last time. I realize you're proud of yourself for keeping the lyrics in your head all these years. It's sad enough that you know the lyrics. That you are proud of this borders on the pathetic. If I ever hear our child humming even three consecutive notes of the Silver Spoons theme song, I will kick you in your balls and I will leave you. Our child will leave with me.
30. I'm dead fucking serious about the Silver Spoons thing.
31. The baby's middle name will not be "You Were a Horrible Fucking Mistake, and We Can Barely Afford You."