Teach your kid not to be an A$$hole

It's feeling hot, hot, hot out these days. We've got a taste of summer in late spring. I love it, a bit humid but I'm not going to complain, just over 2 weeks ago there were flurries in the air. So sweaty is better than snow!

We spent most of the weekend in the hospital, well, I guess we were not in the hospital, but we were staying close enough to the hospital to go and see Big C's dad. 

He is doing much better now after his surgery. They moved him to the rehab ward late last week, but then told him he couldn't do anything because he hadn't been properly assessed. WTF? They want him up and going and strengthening everything, but now they are not going to let him move. He hadn't been assessed they said. I call B.S., everyone covering their collective ass so that no one gets in trouble. 

But the politics of healthcare are not a subject I even want to get into. Big C raised a bit of a stink on Saturday morning and at least his dad got a walker so he could get himself to the bathroom and get up to eat his meals and things so that was good. But I ask why you would move him to a rehab facility and then not offer any sort of rehab for almost 3 days, stupid system if you ask me.

Aside from that it was a good visit. Miss K enjoyed taking care of her poppa and generally found the hospital experience fascinating. We did some swimming at the hotel, some shopping for the hospital bound and kind of got away from it all while not really getting away from it all at the same time.

I did spot some stellar parenting while away as well. And by stellar, I mean not at all exemplary.

I've ranted before about the negligence and disregard a lot of people have for their kids and their behaviour but I've got 2 excellent examples of "why have kids if you aren't going to pay attention to them?"

The first was kind of a passive disregard. We were at the pool, and there was a lady dozing in a chair poolside. I give her credit for snoozing as the noise in the pool area was deafening. I thought nothing of it until I noticed a boy in the pool that could only be her son. He was not a great swimmer, but adequate and in all likelihood tall enough to touch bottom every where in the pool but would you not think you should keep an eye on them?

He did have a guardian over 16 years of age at the pool, but I guess the rules did not state they needed to stay awake. Very odd in my books.

The second annoyance was a larger group of children, I'm assuming 2 or 3 families staying together, were playing at the pool and by playing I mean being general idiots.

Every pool rule was pretty much broken by them and the general lack of consideration by the kids was a direct result of the lack of interest from the parental figures present. 

From what I could tell, the mom's were by the pool area sitting on lounge chairs and the dad's were outside, chatting and smoking with each other.

Again the parental figure of someone over 16 years of age was there, but there was not one of them really paying any attention to the kids.

We had kids playing in the shower that is supposed to be for all guests, spraying one another and basically using it as a splash pad. Two others were playing with a football that was disintegrating and causing all sorts of floating scum in the pool itself. The whole bunch of them were running, trying to throw one another in the pool and jumping into water that was at most 4 feet deep, in some instances only 3 feet deep.

The first couple things are basically just allowing your kids to be douche bags. And for that I'm sorry for society that you're letting them grow up that way. The latter is a safety issue. Any 4 year old who takes swimming lessons can tell you, no running by the pool, no horseplay, no jumping into water that is not a safe depth and so on.

But, my conclusion is some parents don't care. They don't care if their kid is an asshole, they don't care if they're doing something most would consider unsafe or inappropriate behaviour. They don't care enough to even get in the pool with the kid and show them what would be acceptable actions in a public situation.

I will say the kids were not total assholes, but their disregard of all the other patrons in the pool, told me their parents sure as hell didn't give a shit either.

There were 2 threats issued by one dad and one mom when the play got particularly boisterous, but they were largely ignored. The moms went back to chatting and drinking and the dads went back to being outside and smoking.

I just don't get it. Being an impolite moron as a kid is one thing, you don't have much of a chance if your parents teach you nothing. But being a negligent parent is another. I guess they don't care if their kid gets hurt or hurts someone else, its better to just sit back and let things happen.

At least none of the kids was stupid enough to be going in head first to the relatively shallow pool, but how long before one of the wrestling matches beside the pool dumped someone in the pool in the wrong way?

Thankfully it didn't happen, but it bothers the hell out of me. I'm not a perfect parent, I probably yell at my kid and lose my patience way too often. But I do teach her to be kind, considerate, follow the rules and most of all not be a douche bag.

Maybe its that sense of entitlement again. The kids think they're entitled to do whatever the hell they want and the parents think they can sit back and have adult time without having to take responsibility for their kids or teaching their kids appropriate behaviour.

But what do I know? 

Until next time…please teach your kids not to be assholes

Kick some darkness

Spring is here for sure. And with less than a month until summer begins its starting to feel like it. Its hard to believe I'm contemplating putting the air conditioning on when we had snow just a scant 10 days ago, but such is reality.

Reality is, life is hard some times. All in all we're healthy and things are not at tragic proportions so we do count our blessings but the little things do start to add up.

The renovations are done in the previously flooded basement, so that is exciting, but now we've got to find all the replacement stuff for what we lost, so finding time to shop when the weather is good will be tough.

Big C was away all of last week for work, then had to pick up his dad from the airport as he was coming into the area for surgery. The surgery went well but his recovery has been less than smooth and its putting a strain on the whole household.

Miss K wonders why her dad isn't home most days, or why he has to go back to the hospital at a moments notice. She misses him terribly, and at times we cannot even Skype so she misses the connection even more.

Big C is tired of being away from home. He said he's been 50 nights in one particular hotel chain already this year. That does not count about half a dozen nights spent in other hotels. Right now he's spent a third of the year away from home by my estimation.

He is stressed about his dad, stressed about not being home, misses us all terribly but yet feels he needs to be with his dad. He's tired of sitting in the hospital, tired of travelling, tired of eating crappy meals at crappy times.

His dad is a stubborn patient and is making things difficult for Big C at times. Big C wants him to keep a positive attitude and see the bright side to everything, but is sometimes talking to an unwilling listener.

I'm holding down the fort at home, trying to get all the stuff done that needs to be and maybe just maybe squeaking in something I want to do from time to time. I'm managing, but sleep deprived and just plain tired of it all and longing for some normal days in the future.

As I've said in other posts I've got the utmost respect for those who parent/work/and manage household tasks all on their own all the time. It can really, really drag you down. 

I know at some point in time that my other half will return and there will be someone else to load the dishwasher or clean my kids ears or take the dog for a walk or cut the grass. But can you imagine if that person never was there? If you had to do it all day in and day out for the rest of your life? I might just go stark raving bonkers.

On top of all that fun stuff, we've got a dog that is confused as hell as to who is going to be home and when. My car decided that the rear brakes were going to not co-operate with me having a good week and generate a 800 dollar repair bill. We have persistent birds who wish to build nests where we do not want them and so on...

We have a vacation coming in 3 weeks that we're trying to book hotels for as we so desperately need to get away.

Like I said first world problems as we could have it so much worse, but how long before someone says something hurtful, how long before Miss K causes me to lose my shit over something minor? You just don't know and you deal with it as best you can.

We don't take much for granted these days, every hug, every hello or goodbye, every I love you has so much more meaning. 

To paraphrase the Barenaked Ladies, (or Bruce Cockburn if you remember that version) "nothing worth having comes without some sort of fight, you gotta kick at the darkness until it bleeds daylight"

We're fighting, we know all this crazy stuff will come to an end. We are just not sure when. We want to train the dog some more, we'd like to get out golfing, we want to go boating, we have an endless list of things to do around the house, but at times life gets in the way.

And on some level, we say, let life get in the way…it means you are still alive and kicking. We're healthy for the most part, the bills are getting paid and we are safe and happy in our home, really what more could you ask for?

I would say an extra 8 hours sleep if I could have one wish, but aside from all our woes we are going to make it. They are temporary and we'll come out on the other side stronger and better than ever, maybe more tired, but we'll get there

Til next time…kick some darkness out of your life