Remember those "May the 4th" jokes today, dads!

Twenty years ago, parenting books used to be where it was at. Parents who had a million questions about how they should raise their kids didn't go around posting about it on their MySpace pages. They went to Borders, Books A Million, and other now-defunct stores and bought a bunch of books about it! While not all parenting books are written by experts, they're at least a bit more inherently trustworthy than strangers on the internet . When I was a kid, all of the adults in my life told me to be…

For a childless person, I sure spend a lot more time in the enclaves of the parenting side of social media than I probably should. Twitter, TikTok, and Facebook: all of these places have proved to me that parenting is no walk in the park and that it truly takes over a person's life. I don't not want to be a mom because I don't like kids or anything: I don't want to be a mom right now because I don't want to start unknowingly and constantly post cringe parenting content for all of the world to s…

One of the most challenging parts of being a parent is the lack of sleep . Kids wear you down to the point of exhaustion and keep you up at night worrying about them. It's an incredibly unfair catch-22 of the human experience. My poor mother has been unable to sleep since I was born, and I wish I hadn't done that to her. I'm a sprite 23-year-old baby, so naturally, I've never had any problem with sleeping. I just know that if and when I pop a child out of my body, I'm going to stay up all night…

It's difficult to keep the magic of the Easter Bunny alive for your kids. Santa is relatively easy because you can meet a man at a shopping mall that will convincingly portray him. The Tooth Fairy is simple: your kid never sees her unless you mess up or they're a super light sleeper. The Easter Bunny is a hard sell because it's unclear what form he takes. Is he a normal rabbit? Is he one of those scary bunnies in fursuits? Is he a horrifying anthropomorphic half-man, half-rabbit that will haunt…

Best Actress 2024 is a cinch

Not all dads are created equal. And not all dads are technically dads . See, while some Dads stay up late to help with homework, or teaching their progeny to shoot hoops (or paper into a trashcan), there are those who can be considered nothing short of distant. There are also those who aren't in the picture. So in this sense, some moms are dads, and then there are the grandpas who are “dads” to their grandkids. So the thing is, “dad humor” as we know it can never be solely for the fathers that…

Teaching your kids how to drive is no easy task. I gave my parents my fair share of scares when I was driving around with a learner's permit , or "temps," as some regions call it. My mom could drive with me in the high school football stadium parking lot, but that was about it. Beyond that, it was my dad's job to tell me when I was not in the lane, which was the problem 90% of the time when I was learning to drive. I was 15 years old and addicted to veering out of the lane. There are a lot of s…

Stephen Sondheim said the following in his Pulitzer Prize winning musical Sunday in the Park with George. “There are only two worthwhile things to leave behind when you depart this world of ours: children and art.” Of course, this is not an objective fact. You could argue that there are many worthwhile things you leave behind when you die that go beyond those two rigid categories.

I learn new things about parenting by looking at parenting fails. While some aspects of parenting are intuitive, there are about a million things that you need to learn about child-rearing before you actually have a baby. For instance, I was completely ignorant about bed-sharing and safe sleep until I started willingly exposing myself to all of this discourse within mommy Facebook groups . I can't imagine wanting to sleep in the same bed as your baby every night. I move so much in my sleep that…

It's finally March, and you know what that means? Spring Break is imminent, and there's nothing you can do about it. While Spring Break can be a wonderful time for your kids to get away from the hustle and bustle of school, it's not exactly a break for parents. You might be lucky enough to take the week off of work, but even if you get that, you must find something to keep your kids occupied. Spring Break is simply a preview of what's to come after Memorial Day. Your kids are lying around all d…

Boy moms have been rightfully roasted on social media recently. I'm not talking about just any woman who has solely mothered boys. I'm talking about the Oedipal nightmare of TikToker moms who openly admit they are in love with their sons. I have seen the same variation of "watching your son grow up is like experiencing the longest breakup ever" repeatedly on the stupid clock app. Why are these women telling on themselves like this? Why are so many boy moms in love with their sons? That guy Soph…

Everybody gets addicted to saying specific little phrases. 80% of my vocabulary comprises the words “werk” and “gorg.” It's so easy to fall back on cute little slang terms that they can come to define you. My friend Zack is addicted to saying the phrase “dudes rock.” He interjects it whenever he doesn't know how to respond to someone, especially when that someone is a dude. “Dudes rock” is a central tenant of this man's philosophy, and I cannot begrudge that. I don't say “dudes rock” often, but…

Parents love to document every milestone their kid reaches. A child's first steps, first word, and first day of school are all recorded carefully by their mom and dad so they can relive that memory for years to come. However, the most memorable moments of a kid's life usually happen when the cameras aren't around. When I was a kid, I wore my parents down so much one night by asking them endless questions about the biology of conjoined twins. Obviously, they didn't have extensive knowledge of th…

When your kids are driving you nuts, take a breath and think of these memes.

Isn't it wild that so many popular ideas about parenting came from one dude? I'm talking, of course, about Dr. Spock. No, no Dr. Spock from Star Trek, but the Dr. Spock who wrote the most influential book about parenting of the 20th century. The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care revolutionized child care in the 1940s and 1950s and taught parents to see their children as individuals, all with their own individual needs. Before Spock, parenting books told parents to do everything on a rigi…