Parentitlement

We live in a culture of entitlement, there is no doubt about it. Recently the one that irritates me the most is the entitlement of parents.

Why is it that some people have kids and when they find out how much it sucks they suddenly feel like the world owes them everything?  Is this surprising coming from a parent?  It shouldn't be.  This parentitlement pisses me off because it's stupid.  It pisses me off because it's selfish.  But more than anything it pisses me off because, as a parent, I am associated with these assholes.

It's embarrassing.

In case you are lucky enough to not know what I'm talking about I have decided to highlight for you some of the most face-punch deserving bullshit you are likely to run into with the modern parent.

Childism.  This term is used to describe prejudice against children.  Linguistically, this does't really make sense to me.  If you are anything-ist it usually means you are in favour of that thing.  Feminists are in favour of women.  Racists are in favour of their own race and sexists are in favour of their own sex.  Shouldn't this be adultism?  Am I the only one who thinks this is stupid?

There is a lot going on with this term that I don't like.  I don't like that it puts "childism" on the same level as homophobia and racism.  I don't like that it claims that any time a parent puts their own needs ahead of their child's needs it is some kind of abuse.  But I do believe that the intent behind the term is a good one and is born from a desire to protect the vulnerable from slavery and abuse.

And so I think it takes a special kind of asshole to fling "childist" at people who have the audacity to plan an Adults Only event or who want to eat in an expensive restaurant without the wails of a child providing the ambiance.  Because let's be real here: these assholes are not complaining about prejudice against their kids....they are complaining because life is different for them now that they have kids. 

Special Holidays.  You might be thinking I've got it in for Mother's Day now.  Wrong.  I love Mother's Day best out of all the holidays.  It fulfills my holiday longings in every way.  So it really boggled my mind to discover that some idiot dreamed up "Please Take My Children to Work Day"  Otherwise known as "Stay at Home Mother's Day".  Because she is too stupid to celebrate Mother's Day properly she had to go and create a special day for a very special kind of Mother.  And her response to all those working moms she pissed off?  They should go and make their own holiday. 

But there are all kinds of special moms.  How about special holidays for moms who need it even more than us run of the mill working or stay at home moms?  We should have a Single Mother's Day and a Mother of Multiples Day and a Mother of Special Needs Children Day.  In fact why not have just one very inclusive day that says to all mother everywhere that we think they are special and deserving of a special holiday?  Oh, we already do.  It's called Mother's Day.

Stroller Wars.  I have a confession to make.  I'm a mom and I hate strollers.  Whenever I see a mom on the bus with a designer baby-tank I feel a muted kind of rage (but then I do have anger issues).  I feel that it is important for me to come out and say this because the bitches who are attempting to defend their idiotic choice in infant transportation always assume that it is only "selfish childless people" who complain against them.  It isn't.  I do most of my traveling by bus, I have indeed needed to make use of a stroller when doing so and still I say that your giant ass stroller is unnecessary and stupid.  There are only a few cases where I will not judge:  if you have twins, triplets, or a special needs child.  But that's pretty much it.

The truth of the matter is we have choices.  Instead of the baby-van I chose a little umbrella model and a good infant carrier.  Yeah, it sucked for awhile but I did it out of consideration for other travelers as well as myself. With my itsy bitsy fold down stroller I never was told there wasn't enough room on the bus.  It wasn't easy or convenient but it was temporary.   That kind of makes it easier to deal with.  That and knowing that you aren't making life more difficult for those whose conditions are not temporary.

So it is not just the "selfish" childless people but other parents as well.  You want to talk about who's selfish?  People like this woman who refused to accommodate a wheelchair user when asked.  Or people like these moms who felt that it wasn't enough to inconvenience the people riding the bus but had to involve the police and public transit employees as well as causing a big traffic jam for an hour.  It's becoming quite political, too.  On one side of the debate you have elderly/disabled people telling us about what it's like for them to be passed over in favour of able-bodied stroller-moms  and on the other side you have a bunch of grown women going, "Waaaaaa!"

Way to set an example for the next generation, ladies.

Trick or Treat!

Halloween is the best holiday of all the holidays except for maybe Mother's Day.  I have loved it best since childhood.  To hell with Christmas and all those presents and pressure.  Don't give me no Easter and Thanksgiving dinners.  Halloween is the shit.  Especially for a scream queen like myself.

This year it is my year to stay home and hand out candy to the kids.  (Yay!)  I've got The Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby to watch which are, along with The Omen, works of cinematographic art.  And I'm making guacamole and sangria.  OMG, this summer I made sangria for the first time.  It was awesome.  I went looking for recipes online but they all sounded not right somehow.  I guess it's the idea of adding gingerale or lemonade to it.  I mean it's wine.  A shot of brandy does not make it strong enough to water it down like that.  So I ended up developing my own recipe based on what I was able to learn about sangria.

I don't usually make a habit of posting my recipes on my blog but I'm going to post this one in honour of Halloween because I think it's a recipe that even my domestically challenged bitches can get behind.  And because I think that it is one of the easiest ones to make with a minimum amount of shopping.  Also, it will get you totally sloshed so proceed with caution.  When I made mine I thought Daddy was going to drink it with me.  I was as wrong about that as I was about the alcohol content of the drink and the sangria kicked my ass.  Like the recipe, this drink is for sharing.

I now proudly present to you Mommy's Killer Sangria:

Yummy!  But I would never add this much fruit.

1 750 ml bottle of red wine - It doesn't matter what kind.  You are about to mix it up with sugar and fruit and other stuff so you aren't going to notice any of the complexities or tannins or any of that other pretentious shit.  Feel free to go cheap.

1L bottle of Smirnoff Ice -  I figured why add plain lemonade when you could add hard stuff,  right?  Also, now I don't have to buy a whole bottle of brandy just so I can use one shot of it to make what might turn out to be a stupid sangria I wasn't even sure I was going to like anyway.  When was I ever going to drink brandy?  This was the part of the recipe when I thought putting regular lemonade or gingerale with red wine was going to be awful.  I once had a white wine spritzer made with Sprite and it made me lose hope in humanity.  I've always liked Smirnoff Ice and I thought it would have the right kind of grown-up lemony kick without tasting like alcoholic Mountain Dew.

1 orange, 1 lemon and 1 lime - Just squeeze the juice of these.  Most recipes I found want you to put decorative slices in the punch.  Well you know what?  I want to drink my drink without a big annoying hunk of citrus constantly bumping up against my mouth.  Instead I just put the squeezed husks of the fruit in for flavour and then fish them out before serving.

1/2 cup sugar - If you go and make a "skinny girl" out of my killer sangria I will cut you.

So they say when you make this you are supposed to mix together the wine, the fruit juice, the squeezed fruit and the sugar in a pitcher and leave it overnight.  I don't have time for that so fuck it.  I'm giving it an afternoon and serving it on ice.  When you're ready to drink grab that Smirnoff Ice you've been chilling.  The other recipes say to pour two cups into it.  I wrecked myself so badly when I made this (I'm not a drunk I just have very low tolerance) I now forget exactly how much I added.  I'm pretty sure I poured that whole bad boy in there.  This probably shouldn't affect the alcohol content but it will affect the taste so I guess just add whatever amount makes it taste good.

This is a pretty flexible recipe.  You might be asking, "What if I don't like red wine?"  I know "sangria" means something about blood which is why I picked it for a Halloween drink, but who cares?  I've always wanted to try this recipe with white wine because I think it would be great.  I'd love it if any of you could make a white wine version and tell me how it goes.

But what about the guacamole?  Are you kidding?  It's Halloween, you don't have to cook.  If you want guacamole just mash some avocados with lime, tomato and jalapeno.  It's that easy and that's why I'm making it.

Happy Halloween!