LESSON ONE:
1. Go to the grocery store.
2. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office.
3. Go home and pick up the paper.
4. Read it for the last time.
LESSON TWO:
Before you actually have children, find a couple who does and berate them about their...
1. Methods of discipline.
2. Lack of patience.
3. Appallingly low tolerance levels.
4. Allowing their children to run wild.
5. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child's breastfeeding, sleep habits, toilet training, table manners and overall behavior. Enjoy it because it will be the last time in life you will have all the answers.
LESSON THREE:
A really good way to discover how the nights might feel...
1. Get home from work and immediately begin walking around the living room from 5PM to 10PM carrying a wet bag weighing approximately 8-12 pounds, with a radio turned to static {or some other equally obnoxious sound} playing loudly. Eat cold food with one hand for dinner.
2. At 10PM, put the bag down gently, set the alarm for midnight, and go to sleep.
3. Get up at 12 and walk around the living room again, with the bag, until 1AM.
4. Set the alarm for 3AM.
5. Since you can't get back to sleep, get up at 2AM, make a drink and watch an infomercial.
6. Go to bed at 2:45AM.
7. Get up at 3AM when the alarm goes off.
8. Quietly sing songs in the dark until 4AM.
9. Get up. Make breakfast. Get ready for work, go to work, work hard and be productive.
Repeat steps 1-9 each night. Keep this up for 3-5 years. Look cheerful and together.
LESSON FOUR:
Can you stand the mess children make? To find out...
1. Smear peanut butter onto the sofa and jelly onto the curtains.
2. Hide a piece of raw chicken behind the stereo and leave it there all summer.
3. Stick your fingers in the flower bed.
4. Then rub them on the clean walls.
5. Take your favorite book and/or photo album. Destroy it.
6. Pour milk all over your new pillows. Cover the stains with crayons. How does that look?
LESSON FIVE:
Dressing small children is not as easy as it seems.
1. Buy an octopus and a small bag made out of loose mesh.
2. Attempt to put the octopus into the bag so that none of the arms hang out.
Time allotted for this - all morning.
LESSON SIX:
Forget the BMW and buy a minivan. And don't think that you can leave it out in the driveway all spotless and shiny. Family cars don't look like that.
1. Buy a chocolate ice cream cone and put it on the glove compartment. Leave it there.
2. Get a dime. Stick it in the CD player.
3. Take a family size package of chocolate cookies. Mash them into the back seat making sure you really take the time to shove them as far as you can down into the cracks. Sprinkle Cheerios all over the floor and proceed to smash them full force with your foot.
4. Run a garden rake along both sides of the car.
LESSON SEVEN:
Go to your local grocery store. Take with you the closest thing you can find to a preschool child. {A full grown goat is an excellent choice}. If you intend to have more than one child, then definitely take more than one goat. No leashes allowed. Buy your week's groceries without letting the goats out of your sight. Pay for everything the goat eats or destroys. Until you can easily accomplish this, do not even contemplate having children.
LESSON EIGHT:
1. Hollow out a melon.
2. Make a small hole in the side.
3. Suspend it from the ceiling and swing it from side to side.
4. Now get a bowl of soggy Cheerios and attempt to spoon them into the swaying melon by pretending to be an airplane.
5. Continue until half the Cheerios are gone.
6. Tip half of the remaining into your lap. The other half, just throw up in the air.
You are now ready to feed a 9-month old baby.
LESSON NINE:
Make a recording of Fran Drescher saying "mommy!" repeatedly. Important: no more than a four second delay between each "mommy"; occasional crescendo to the level of a supersonic jet is required. Play this tape in your car everywhere you go for the next four years. You are now ready to take a car ride with a toddler.
LESSON TEN:
Start talking to an adult of your choice. Have someone else continually tug on your skirt hem, shirt sleeve or elbow while playing the "mommy" tape from Lesson Nine above. You are now ready to have a conversation with an adult while there is a child in the room.
