Kidstuff

I chanced upon this site the other day. Just another dating site. Except for one little difference. It's meant exclusively for those who hate kids. So, happily, I am not the only person on earth who thinks babies are selfish, egoistical, bawling balls of lard.

And its not just the kids themselves who get on my nerves; what pisses me even more is the way their manufacturers (and other stakeholders) hype them out to be the greatest of engineering marvels. Some of my most annoying experiences in life have related to delusional parents parading their produce's supposedly prodigal talents for all to admire. I recall, with particular horror, the time I was invited to a friend's two-year-old's birthday party, and had been made to sit through a poetry recital by the kid. Amidst the garish balloons and confetti, the neighbourhood litter, the piles of food and the loads of loot for the kid, the star of the show, this orang-outang, is made to stand on a table for its grand performance.

Proud grandpa prods :

"Johnny, Johnny?"

The monkey lisps : 

"Yechch pappa?"

Grandpa, encouraged at having the show going his way : 

"Eating sugar?"

Monkey, practised and on cue : 

"No pappa."

By now, grandpa is glowing like a halogen bulb on heat : 

"Telling a lie?"

His DNA in flesh and blood : 

"No pappa."

Grandpa knows that climax is near, rasps : 

"Open your mouth!"

Electric silence all around. The air is pregnant with anticipation. The ape-ette knows its moment is here; it maxes the dramatic effect with a pause, sweeps its audience with a slow and deliberate wave of its prodigal head, and then, with a flourish that would put even the most seasoned of stage-performers to shame, punchlines :

"Ha, ha, ha."

The audience goes wild. Its obligatory upon everyone else in the room to applaud - wow, amazing, so-cute, ha-ha-ha etc. Anything less could mean eternal damnation, maybe hung upside-down from a lampost next to hell's largest kindergarten school for all afterlife.

Peden, who is one of those rare people who feels the same way about kids as I do - and who is, therefore, often labelled as a freak - thinks that most people enjoy such performances, and some even envy the parents with a when-will-I-have-my-own-so-that-even-I-can-flaunt-in-this-manner? attitude. I think she got it wrong there; what those suposedly envious people really feel during such performances is, "I am so bored and pissed. Wait till I manufacture one of those things of my own and piss you to death like you are pissing me now."

Its not for nothing that one of my favourite jokes goes like this :

What's white and red and pink and goes round and round?

A baby in a mixie.