My Pet Baby

 

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Somebody else said it, not me.  ‘Ah, parenthood--it’s just like having a dog, isn’t it?’  I think it was my mother.  This could explain a lot about me.  Anyway, I quickly chided her comparison and pshawed in a self-righteous parental manner.  

I mean, it couldn’t be that simple, could it?  Raising a dog?  I grew up with dogs and they’re a lot of work, sure.  But you can always beat them.  Oh, I kid, I kid.  I would never hit a defenseless creature, except for maybe my brother.  No no, parenting is way harder, I tell myself.  But mostly I tell everyone else, to elicit that especially winning combination of pity and admiration.

Anyway, the more I thought about it, maybe there is something to this assertion.  Let’s see--both respond favorably to high-pitched noises and expect you to clean up their doo.  They are generally friendly, but smell bad.  They sleep a lot.  I mean, there are some differences, for sure.  Dogs have four legs, for example.  Most of them have tails, except for those poor bastards in that Sarah McLachlan commercial.  Dogs bark and have sharp teeth and eat their own vomit.  

But why dwell on the differences?  That just creates derision and paranoia.  That’s letting the terrorists win.  What I’m here to do is bring us all together and focus on our commonalities.  With that, I give you:

The Top Five Reasons A Baby Is Just Like A Dog  

5.  A Baby can not speak, but has a lexical semi-recognition of about 14 words.  However, you can often say some pretty vile, offensive shit with the right intonation and totally get away with it.  Makes you wonder how iron-clad that “vocabulary” really is then.

4.  Taking a Baby to the park will guarantee him being sized up and whispered about by various owners and babies alike (not to mention a generous butt-sniffing) under the guise of ‘healthy socialization.’

3.  Assuming you live on a relatively secluded compound, you can put Baby outside when he’s been bad.  Tying Baby’s leash to the clothesline out back is a grand babysitting solution, but watch out for those poisonous squirrels.

2.  Leaving Baby locked in the car while you run into the liquor store always yields a judgy look or two, mostly from non-parents.  However, leaving Baby in the Blockbuster parking lot is generally deemed acceptable.

1.  You just can’t leave Baby home alone for more than 9 hours at a stretch.  Even 8 is really pushing it, guys.