So it's currently 3 pm pacific time, and my company is hosting their annual Halloween party that they put on for the employees' kids. The party is supposed to start up at 4:30, so guess when Dana is leaving work today? Anyhow, there is a really obnoxious project manager that works in our Architecture department, who is forever raising her voice, talking down to people and generally being a bitch. Well, her kid is here right now, under the auspices of "helping the committee set up for the party," and let's just say the apple don't fall too far from the tree. This kid has been here since 1:30, and has done nothing but run up and down the halls, pop balloons, steal candy off of people's desks, yell, get belligerent with my manager when he was on the elevator goofing off and my manager needed to use it, etc., etc. Of course, Mom is nowhere to be found.

Of course, I can shut the door to my office, but welcome to my Friday afternoon.

Other people's kids suck.

Actually, Other People's Kids would be a good band name.

I don't even think that other people's kids necessarily suck, but this kid in particular is the biggest pain in the ass. Whenever she brings him into work, all he does is disrupt everyone else's work. Just once, I'd like to trip him, slap him in the back of the head, or tell him to shut the fuck up, and know that I wouldn't get any shit later for it. Highly unlikely.

Learn to do the cookie monster voice, then say, "Children should be eaten, not seen or heard".

That's what I do. Then they cry, and I act all innocent like.

thats why we dont really allow kids at work.

Would love to, but this kid is at that snappy pre-teen stage where he'd either (a) laugh at me and run away, or (b) pull a gun on me.

Ya'll hiring?

Back at BDS I had to go thru this every year...& ALL the kids were unruly. Our jobs were to LISTEN to song files...it was downright rude to bring the screamin' kids in there.

Slip the kid a Benadryl tablet inside a Hershey's Kiss and watch him go find a corner to lie down and take a nap.

Ah, yes, that is a different problem. A kid like that pulled a knife on a babysitter once. Future jail resident.

There was a band from out Seattle way in the late 80's that did a song called "I Wanna Kill My Neighbor's Kids". Don't remember the band's name, don't know that it was ever released. They sent a tape to Irwin on WFMU who played it weekly. I would mortgage the house to get a copy of it.

bad mom.

You and Ol' Bulee know the same people?

No, apparently, it's a frequent problem. Maybe I knew the his problem kids' parents.

I forget to mention the final solution: cyanide. Lace candy, allow him to steal from desk, problem solved.

seriously. A bit of the ol' "one, two, punch-in-the-face" beats the hell outta "time-outs" and all the other bullshit they've been giving to kids with over-diagnosed 'behaviour problems' these days. There is an ever-increasing rate of what i like to call "little shits", and you don't have to look far to find the problem. Parents who lack discipline...

im all for punching children

It's not a problem where I work.

"Hey, kids- look! A table saw!"

Discipline, yes.
Hitting, no.
Neglect, no.

There's far more problems stemming from kids being neglected and not monitored/supervised than from lack-of-punching-in-face.

It's parents who have got a clue what their kids are doing that are the problem. Kids don't need to be whacked around. They need firm boundaries, expectations and safety.

(Oh, and the Benadryl trick works)