Blogs > Kid You Not

Kid You Not believes in the Wizard of Oz style of parenting: All you need is a brain, some courage and a heart. Oh, and some Jager.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Tears across Connecticut

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.
W.H. Auden

Rest in peace, Jennifer Hawke-Petit, Hayley Petit and Michaela Petit. God give you strength, William Petit.

Ronald McDonald strikes again


Once again, McDonalds junk food restaurants are exploiting kids under the guise of an educational program. As noted here more times than Big Macs have calories, McDonalds loves to send a costumed Ronald McDonald into schools and libraries to talk about reading, physical fitness or safety. All worthy topics, but what McDonalds is really interested in is selling french fries, attracting young customers-for-life and undercutting parental control.
This time, the Seymour Public Library (why is it always the Valley?) had Ronald McDonald in earlier this month to talk about reading. Perhaps these young readers should read the nutrition content of the average quarter pounder with cheese and get a lesson on fat, sugar and salt.
Getting kids enthused about reading is important, but there are better cheerleaders than the mascot for the worst food you could possibly give your kid. Scholastic, Inc. could send Clifford, the Big Red Dog, for instance. But it’s far easier for a library or school to simply pick up the phone when the Connecticut and Western Massachusetts McDonald’s Owner/Operator Association calls pitching Ronald’s availability. Then the association’s PR firm, Cronin and Company, Inc. of Glastonbury makes sure newspapers cover the event.
As I’ve noted in the past, some of the parents of these kids may be trying to keep their kids out of McDonalds. These “It’s Book Time with Ronald McDonald” or “Active Achievers” events undermine that effort. Here’s what Yale nutrition expert Kelly Brownell says: “It is a travesty to have a PE program branded by McDonald’s. It further commercializes schools and gets the company even more publicity with children.”
Schools and libraries need to be a little smarter about this insidious effort.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Code breakers


Out here in suburbia among parents of elementary school kids, the most highly-anticipated event of summer is the annoucement of the upcoming school year’s class assignment. The Harry Potter book? Nope. The Red Sox’ August suck fest? Not even close.
The annoucement allows us parents to determine these crucial facts:
1. Is our kid’s best friend in her class?
2. Is the kid whose mom is all freaky about scheduling parents to read to the classroom in the class?
3. Did our kid get the teacher who makes Dick Cheney look like Captain Kangaroo?
There’s a new principal at our neighborhood school, and I’m sure he’s not too happy with how the classroom assignments leaked out. The school mailed out notices about meetings with the new principal, and tucked in the corner of the address label on the envelope was a code that most of us figured was just random letters and numbers, if we noticed them at all. But a few moms who could put World War II code breakers to shame quickly realized that the last two figures was the classroom assignment. If is was “2J” then your second grader had Miss Jones.
The e-mail chains burned with the hot news and now we can all go back to waiting for Jonathan Papelbon to break his wrist getting out of his Hummer.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Back from vacation, in need of rest


Just walked into work after a week’s vacation to beautiful New Hampshire, only to have one of the newsroom interns inform us he’s back from St. Maarten and St. Barts.
That’s just great. I have underwear older than this kid, and he’s taking better vacations than me. While he was probably hobnobbing with topless eurotrash supermodels, my wife and I were desperately trying to keep track of a pair of our 7-year-old daughter’s $30 purple Crocs, a greasy tube of sunscreen and a 3-year-old who doesn’t consider it a successful vacation until she visits at least one emergency room.
We actually had a great time in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. I’ve been trying to get the girls more into outdoor adventures and this year I added numerous waterfalls and swimming holes to the usual agenda of all-day visits to Storyland and Santa’s Village. For the first time, I think the girls truly understood that standing at the bottom of majestic 65-foot Glen Ellis falls (shown here)is more fulfilling than Dr. Geyser’s Wacky Water Ride and scrambling over rocks worn smooth by eons of rushing water is more fun than the Polar Coaster. And perhaps seeing a patch of icy snow 6,000 feet up Mt. Washington in July might be more inspiring that Cinderella’s Castle. OK, that’s pushing it a bit too far.
This vacation also marked a complete abandonment of my parental vow to never have a portable DVD player for the car. A neighbor loaned us theirs and, knowing the 5-hour drive can be a grueling slog rivaling a 10th century Crusade, I figured what the heck. Aside from having to listen to Dora for 45-minutes, the DVD player provided blissful backseat peace and quiet. I now vow to only use the DVD player on long trips. Like to Trader Joe’s.
So now we’re home and the car has been cleaned of sticky empty juices boxes and crushed Goldfish. It’s late at night and I’m sitting on the sofa flicking through photo after photo of smiling, happy children. That makes it all worthwhile.
An occasional topless eurotrash supermodel wouldn’t hurt, though.