Kids. To have, or not to have- that really isn't the question.

The question is more along the lines of should I be allowed to have kids.

I have a few friends that already have kids, and I love them dearly. I'm Aunt Bekky to most of them, and they're great kids. I also have a few more friends that are about to have their first child, and I couldn't be happier for them. I know they'll be great kids as well. You know what makes all of these kids so great?

They're not mine! I can give them back anytime I want. Yay me! I get to have fun with them and be there for them, but as soon as they start annoying me, I'm all, "You know who loves you? Mom and Dad! Go annoy them now! Byyyyeee!"

Seriously, I've sat down and weighed the pros and cons of having kids (not that I'm in any kind of position to start popping them out or anything).  Here's the list that I've come up with as of tonight. I'm sure there will be more added at some point, but for now, this is it:

Cons

1. I have a hard enough time making myself to the daily stuff (get up, eat, go to bed at a decent time, training myself for the zombie apocalypse, etc.). If I can't even make myself do all that stuff, how do I expect to teach a baby to do the same. I mean, seriously....do you know how hard it is to train a baby to shoot a flame thrower without catching your pet on fire in the process. I'll tell you: hard. I'm just now learning that one myself. Sorry, Naruto (my cat, not the cartoon character).
2. I hate cleaning and doing laundry. When you have a baby, both of these things multiply by, like, five hundred...thousand percent. So I hear anyway. No thank you. I'm not even gonna take the chance. Not until I can afford to hire a maid.
3. Babies don't do much for a while. They eat, poop, and sleep. They can't even carry on a decent conversation..seriously, how am I supposed to be entertained during this waiting period? It's like waiting for a game to load....for months. Fuck that. I'm fairly certain I popped out of the womb talking, so I'm gonna need Hypothetical Baby to do the same. We will revisit the name Hypothetical Baby in the Pros section. If I remember.
4. I forget where things are constantly. I don't trust myself to take a baby out in public.  People say "When it's your baby, things change...you won't feel that way or do those things!" Clearly, you overestimate my attention span and memory. I don't want to take the chance of going grocery shopping, and then, "Holy shit! Where's little Timmy, and why am I putting this jug of milk in the car seat?!"
5. You're stuck with your baby. You can't give them back to anyone when they start screaming, and if you try, I'm pretty sure that would earn you some pretty nasty looks from strangers. I guess they don't want your shrieking little shit machine either. Who can blame them, really? Congratulations! You're now the person people give little Denny back to. You could try giving him back to the doctor that delivered him, but apparently that's "frowned upon". Whatever. If you have a spouse, you could try giving him back to them, but chances are they'll give him right back, then you're both stuck in a neverending game of hot potato...er....baby.
6. I'm way to selfish at this point in my life. I like being able to pick up and go if I want (well, on the weekends, at least...curse you, Monday-Friday job!!). I also like lying in bed all day, watching movies or reading if I so choose. You can't do these things when you have kids. Word on the street is they have to be "fed" and "taken care of". Everyday, all day. Seriously, who has time for that?? Little Bobby...or Timmy...whatever your name is, I'm going to need you to start pulling your weight around here. I'm not saying you have to get a job or anything (although you might want to check out the "jobs wanted" section of the Chronicle...wait...you can't read, either?? Goddamnit, Timmy!!). Alls I'm saying is it would be nice if you changed your own diaper or picked up your onsies off the floor every now and then. Mommy's watching her stories.
7. Rumor is that you get what you gave as a child tenfold. If that's true, I'm fucked. I don't think anything can prepare me for that.
8. They can't hold their liquor for shit.

Pros

1. My kid is going to be hilariously awesome. If he's not, I'll just take him back and demand a new one. That's how it works, right? .....Right??
2. I'll get to make up stories just to fuck with him. My parents did it to me, and I plan on passing that down to my kid. It's like a fucked up family tradtion, but instead of having warm and fuzzies, they'll get night terrors and therapy...yay!!! For example, I was adopted, and whenever I acted up, my parents told me that they were going to call the stork company to come back and pick me up so they could get a better behaved child. There was no laughing; they said this with completely straight faces. One day, we went to the zoo, and as we rounded the corner, there they were, waiting at the front of their enclosure: storks. I flipped  the fuck out, did an about face, and ran as fast as my little legs would carry me, screaming at the top of my lungs that I was sorry and promised to be good, just "pleasepleasepleasedon'tletthestorkstakemeback". When my parents caught up to me, they could have very easily have said, "We didn't really mean it....storks don't do that." But noooo, not my parents. Then they would have had to admitt that they lied. So, they took the lie even further and told me I didn't have to worry about these storks because they're retired. They even got a goddamn zookeeper in on it, and had him tell me that those storks couldn't fly anywhere and they were here for the rest of their lives. Another time, they told me that we had snakes in the attic because I liked to climb to the top of the stairs and perch (I'm a weird one, I know). The joke was on them because I liked snakes, so it just fueled my curiosity about the attic. So once again, they took the lie further...my mom bruises really easily, and this one time, she had a bruise on her shin from walking into something, and she pointed down to it and said, "No, these snakes are vicious and poionous...one of them attacked me and I had to go to the hospital.  If you go up there, they'll probably eat you alive." Sure as shit, I didn't go up there until I was old enough to know her story was bullshit. Well played, Mom...well played indeed. So yeah, I'm totally traumatizing my kid when he's old enough to understand what I'm saying. And if he's anything like me, he should turn out fine...ish.
3. Hypothetical Baby sounds like some kind of baby superhero....I don't know what his powers are, but with a name like that, I think he can have any goddamn power he wants. Or any power I think of to tell people. He'll be the reigning champ of baby fight club with his super speed and super strength!

Wow....8 to 3. It might sound like I have something against kids, but I swear I don't. I love kids....I'm just so not ready for my own yet. For now, I'll live vicariously through my friends because their kids are all hilariously awesome, I can still tell them insane things that my friends will have to then try to explain, and I can invent powers for them too. So really, this is just allowing me to hone my parenting skills. Go me!!

I was apparently Samuel L. Jackson as a child. Also I can't draw stairs.

Note: Forgive me if there are typos...I didn't take the time to proof read...I know, it's horrible...