Hack Your Life

Dear Mr. Baby:

Departing from our usual format, I'm taking some of your nuggets of wisdom, most of which you mysteriously report having forgotten almost immediately upon being queried about the afterma...er...result, and sharing them with the world of the internet. Thus without further ado:

10 Life Hacks to Make Your Life...Different

 1) Get flexible about creams. If you apply enough of any cream, it will mostly work for sun protection, and if you usually eat only minimal amounts of things before throwing them on the floor, you can eat just about anything, whether classified as a food or not. So why not use things like cream cheese and sunscreen interchangeably? This allows you to do things like store both your lunch and your lotion outside, without being entirely certain whether either one will rot. as a bonus, it's a pleasant surprise to have a coconut aroma on your bagel once in a while.

2) Pre-prep it! Pre-salt your and everyone else's food by shaking a small amount of salt on each plate in the dining room. Restack them so no one knows that you've done it. They'll be so pleased when they see how much time it saves them.

3) Plan ahead for the doldrums. Keep a stash of boogers in places where you might be stuck for long periods of time. These can be eaten as a snack, made into cars, or simply peeled off and re-glued with some spit for easy entertainment.

4) Paste It! Make a green-brown paste out any food that is served to you for faster, hand-optional eating and easy portability. Remove the food from the original serving container, use the container to smash it, add some water from your sippy cup, and stir. Wear as a mask, or a food-glove, or tucked away to be disposed of later by the dog.

5) Cut down. Cut down on laundry time by skipping the entire process. Offer to take laundry to the laundry room, and then toss it in the dryer.

6) Combine your tasks. If you have the toothbrush out, don't waste an opportunity. Use it to clean the nooks and crannies of the bathtub as well as brushing your teeth. No need to worry about the order of these activities - you can even alternate to make each task seem less tedious.

7) Smash it. Cut down on chewing and digesting by pre-smashing your food. You can do this when it is served to you, or, for optimal efficiency, smash all your fruit right when you get it home from the store.

8) Mouse it up. There is a way to do everything on the computer with a mouse - you may just need motivation to find out how! Remove the keys from the computer to speed up your learning curve.

9) Heat it up. Place anything in the microwave to put the umpf back in your afternoon. Most microwaves automatically cook for 30 seconds just by pressing ''Start.''

10) Think outside the stool. Don't be afraid to use your little brother to reach high-up items. Coax him to right beneath the thing you want to reach, push (the force required will differ from brother to brother) and stand on him. By the time you obtain your high-up item, your ''stool' is already off to a less conspicuous place, and you have ''no way of getting up there,'' so it obviously wasn't you.

OutFoxed

Dear Mr. Baby:

Of late you have done a great many things which merit lauding, from your halfhearted acquiescence to my request to stop banging your feet on the dryer, to your three-to-four star potty days, to preceding your knocking over of Second Baby with what seem to be genuine cheers for his precarious first steps about the house. All of this is great, but you deserve the Slow Clap for having mastered, at the tender age of 30 months, many of the irrefutable argumentation styles that have been honed over many years by the major propaganda networks of our time. So here's to your future career as a conservative talk show host or political speechwriter, along with a few of my personal favorites, listed by argumentative technique: 

Obfuscation the issue, followed by a remorselessly feel-good ending

M: A, please stop waving your tortilla around, you're flinging tuna fish everywhere.
A: No, it's the same. It's fixed, and it's broken. And so it's really out there, and you're a winner. 

Projection

M: Hey you're being a little bit too loud. The baby is sleeping.
A: No you're being too loud.
M: I'm actually -
A: Shhhhhht.
M: What are you -
A: Shhhhhhhht. Mama, shhht. You're talking too loud.

Rewriting History

M: Look, sorry you have a bad taste in your mouth, but you were eating a crayon, just like I said not to do.
A: I ate a peanut butter and a cookie.
M: Looks like you ate a crayon.Just by all the blue wax on your lips.
A: No that's not right. I was eating spaghetti.

Asking for clarification, where none is needed, followed by misdirection

M: If you run over my foot again, I'll have to put your bicycle in the mud room.
A: What's a bicycle? What's a bicycle? What's a foot means? I don't know. Oh, look, it's another bee!


Simultaneous grammatical pedantry and vagueness


M: You can't put that there, because it's for Tata. It's Father's Day.
A: He's not a father! He's a Tata! And that's not that, it's my ruckskater!
M: Okay fine, but you can't have it.
A: What's a have?

Character assassination

M: Please don't put that there, it will catch on fire.
A: I don't understand what you're saying to me, your mouth is really full.
M: Uh...No it's not.
A: Please chew your food.  It's not nice.
M: I'm not eating.
A: Oh I'm sorry, I can't understand you when your mouth is full.

Citing ''statistics'' to muddle the issue

M: What are you doing there, bud?
A: Oh, it's just...twenty-hundred and five.
M: No but what are you doing?
A: Twenty-seven.  

Fear mongering

M: Uh...I don't think that's the best idea.
A: No, I'm going to rescue. It's really important. Don't be scared.


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