Guardian Gifts

"Young man, go to your room and stay there until your cerebral cortex matures."

'The trick is to make it look as easy as possible while, underneath, you're paddling like hell.'

"It's the whole kindergarten thing, Mom. I'm alone in there, swimming with the sharks."

'...but if daddy raised your allowance he'd be hurting the economy by stimulating inflation. You wouldn't want him to do that, would you?'

"All I ask is a chance to ruin my life in my own way."

'Someday son, all this will be yours to argue with the Environmental Protection Agency over.'

'Do any of your parents know what you're up to here?' 'Mam! Dad!' 'What?'

"Y'know, sooner or later we're going to have to let her go out unaccompanied."

Choices, choices.

"I can't protect you from everything, but I can read you stories that make you believe I can protect you from everything."

'Just wait till it's my turn to make long-term care decisions for you!'

"Harris here is looking after children's accounts."

"You spoil that child!"

MOTHER: All generations of family pester her: Did you iron my shirt? Can I get my ears pierced? etc

'School been cancelled again...I'm bringing the kids to work with me.'

'I say it's spinach and the heck with it!'

'The kids just love doing paint by numbers.'

"What do you recommend for someone recovering from a tantrum?"

"Oh, and when you get a chance, would you start taking responsibility for your own life?"

"It may not be a good report card but I'm working with the genes you dealt me."

"Hold it right there, ma'am! If you get too close to the artwork, I'll have to ask you to leave the gallery."

'I'm your mother -- I'm supposed to impose my moral values on you!'

'Can you tell me what I've written? I can't read!'

As far as sanctions go I find making them watch back to back episodes of ' the Antiques Roadshow' works well...

'You want me to stop playing video games and go outside to play? In all that air pollution?'

'Sure, go ahead! Evolve! It's all the rage, I know! Have fun! I'll just sit here in this murky, primordial soup with nothing but plankton for company. Why should you stay here with your mother? The one who raised you, fed you...'

"I think oral sex is when they just talk about it."

'First thing in the morning I'm ringing the school about the amount of homework he's getting.'

'Pop, is that where they make all of those new medicines with the bad side effects?'

"When do you first think I wasn't a gifted child?"

'But I can't go to bed yet, Mom. Kids watch an average of seven hours of TV a day, and I've only watched five and a half hours.'

"I think we should give day camp a chance, Adrian. Let's not become prisoners of our own dogma."

'I've inoculated you against sexually transmitted cancer, given you drugs and alcohol awareness and instructed your parents to keep you out of the sun. Now go and enjoy your childhood.'

"When I ask you to pick up the kids, you only have to get ours."

'We couldn't afford health care any longer so you better start eating better!'