Every childhood begins as a calm, fact-based documentary. Then, somewhere around kindergarten, it quietly rebrands itself as a low-budget horror anthology narrated by whichever adult has the loudest voice. One minute, kids are peacefully existing. The next, they’re told that the television is scheming to steal their eyesight, frogs are roaming agents of dermatological chaos, and wet hair is one…
-
-
Things Parents Have Said Immediately After the Birth of Their Newborn Child Drawn from medical memoirs, birth-room transcripts, and real interviews
What do parents actually say the first time they meet the tiny stranger they’ve just brought into the world? It’s not all “miracle of life” and soft-focus Hallmark narration. Sometimes it’s just plain weird. Here are seven genuinely odd remarks that new parents blurted out in the delivery room, documented in medical memoirs, birth-room transcripts, clinician notes, and interviews. No…
-
Grimm Prospects – Episode I Al Bundy’s advice for getting by in life one fairy tale at a time
Baa, Baa, Black Sheep A simple rhyme in which a black sheep answers a child’s request for wool, giving it to the master, the dame, and a small boy. Baa, baa, black sheep. Yeah, I know the guy. Poor sap gets asked if he’s got any wool, and like every beaten-down husband in America, he coughs it all up. One…
-
Grimm Prospects – Episode II
London Bridge Is Falling Down A repetitive rhyme about the collapse of London Bridge and many humorous attempts to repair it with different materials. London Bridge is falling down. And you know what? Of course it is. Everything falls down. Buildings, paychecks, my pants the second I bend over in the shoe store. Nothing lasts. You put your heart, your…
-
Grimm Prospects – Episode III Al Bundy’s advice for getting by in life one fairy tale at a time
Rock-a-bye Baby A lullaby where a baby in a cradle, high in a tree, is rocked by the wind until the bough breaks, dropping it down. Rock-a-bye Baby. Yeah, nothing screams “good parenting” like sticking your kid in a cradle up in a tree. Who even thinks of that? Put the baby in a crib, put it on the floor,…
