So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[tonyb]

...

Although, with a cover, especially when my son was bigger, people couldn't help but notice. I never tried to hide nursing him, though, if he was hungry, I fed him. I have a thick skin, and in all my life that I've been aware of breastfeeding I've only seen 3 or 4 women nurse in public, I think because it isn't normalized.

Maybe there's a regional difference. Public breastfeeding, while not exactly commonplace in the Puget Sound region, isn't uncommon, either.

As to a triviality that DOES tick me off ...

Parents who allow their toddlers to make a mess of restaurant tables and the surrounding floors. Yeah, I know, it's not reasonable to expect an 18-month-old NOT to make a bit of a mess. So maybe the little buzzard shouldn't be in a restaurant with all those other patrons just yet. Or maybe his or her parents should offer him or her less messy food. Or ...

 

[GHT]

Parents who allow their toddlers to make a mess of restaurant tables and the surrounding floors. ..

When I first read this I thought, "there's a timebomb waiting to go off," yet no one has responded. Can't make up my mind if I'm impressed by that, or not.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The place I go for breakfast has, like most cheap little lunchrooms in Maine, a lobster tank right near the cash register. If a kid starts cutting up rough during a meal, it's not uncommon for the parent to threaten to throw said child in the tank with the lobsters. That usually settles 'em down.

 

[tonyb]

When I first read this I thought, "there's a timebomb waiting to go off," yet no one has responded. Can't make up my mind if I'm impressed by that, or not.

I have friends with whom I get along just fine, but I'm thankful that their little kids are no longer little kids.

 

[2jakes]

The place I go for breakfast has, like most cheap little lunchrooms in Maine, a lobster tank right near the cash register. If a kid starts cutting up rough during a meal, it's not uncommon for the parent to threaten to throw said child in the tank with the lobsters. That usually settles 'em down.

As a kid, the threat of being taken to the doctor and hospitals.
To this day, I’m not comfortable going there.
I get chills thinking about the shots I was given as a kid with painful
1950s needles.

But, I will go visit friends in the hospital anytime.
I won’t like it, but I don’t show it.
I keep it to myself.
I just try to cheer them up the best I can.

As for myself, I found out that a happy pill and I’m good to go.

 

[ChiTownScion]

As a kid, the threat of being taken to the doctor and hospitals.
To this day, I’m not comfortable going there.
I get chills thinking about the shots I was given as a kid with painful
1950s needles.

That was always a major bone of contention of mine when I worked hospital security: some mom (it was ALWAYS the mom for some reason) would see a nurse walking down a main floor corridor, and tell their kid, "If you won't behave , that NURSE is gonna give you a SHOT!!" Or seeing me in my hospital security uniform, "... that policeman is gonna put you in JAIL!!"

Injections are given for medical reasons, not behavior modification. And the police (of which I was not a member- nor desired to be) are not there to add muscle to your misdirected parenting exercises. Small wonder that their kids grow up with such mucked up attitudes.

 

[2jakes]

^^^^^
Parents and discipline.

Seen kids in the store throw a fit on the floor, screaming so loud my ears almost bled.
Kicked mommy in the leg and she did nothing.
Other times, the kid as much as looks the wrong way and gets slapped in the face.

One time a mother yanked her daughter’s hair from the back so hard, I even screamed.

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

As a kid, the threat of being taken to the doctor and hospitals.
To this day, I’m not comfortable going there.
I get chills thinking about the shots I was given as a kid with painful
1950s needles.

But, I will go visit friends in the hospital anytime.
I won’t like it, but I don’t show it.
I keep it to myself.
I just try to cheer them up the best I can.

As for myself, I found out that a happy pill and I’m good to go.

To this day that smell of isopropyl alcohol gives me chills. I hated shots!

 

[Trenchfriend]

To this day that smell of isopropyl alcohol gives me chills. I hated shots!

Cassette-drive cleaning.

 

[2jakes]

To this day that smell of isopropyl alcohol gives me chills. I hated shots!

This is how much I hate shots....

The dentist is within walking distance.
So I had this brilliant idea to “numb” myself with a couple of straight shots of tequila.

It didn’t take long to put me in a “relaxed-I-don’t-give-a-hoot” mood fast.

To make a long story short:
Dentist told me that because of what I did, he had to give me more shots.

Cassette-drive cleaning.

Actually for me it’s only the isopropyl alcohol that I loathe.
I just cleaned my VHS player with similar fluid & it wasn’t that bad.

 

[Fading Fast]

When I first read this I thought, "there's a timebomb waiting to go off," yet no one has responded. Can't make up my mind if I'm impressed by that, or not.

I, too, expected an explosion. And that is the only thing I've said - no implication, no other opinion

^^^^^
Parents and discipline.

Seen kids in the store throw a fit on the floor, screaming so loud my ears almost bled.
Kicked mommy in the leg and she did nothing.
Other times, the kid as much as looks the wrong way and gets slapped in the face.

One time a mother yanked her daughter’s hair from the back so hard, I even screamed.

As you note, in public, one does see both extremes and all the in-between.

I would say the center has shifted since I was a kid. Back then, the social norm was more toward parent-set boundaries and discipling if those boundaries were broken; now I see more negotiation with the kids over the boundaries and, a lot of times, more discussion, not discipline, even when those "agreed upon" boundaries are broken.

Also, other than in true kid-focused restaurants, I was taught - and it didn't seem out of the norm at the time (late '60s / early '70s) - that I had to behave like an adult if I wanted to go to a restaurant (or any "adult" place) - period, full stop. No toys, no whining, no squirming, (and definitely) no running around or even leaving your seat without permission (and even then, only to go to the bathroom). But that was also how things worked at our meals at home, so for me, I was good to go at an early age.

 

[tonyb]

...

Also, other than in true kid-focused restaurants, I was taught - and it didn't seem out of the norm at the time (late '60s / early '70s) - that I had to behave like an adult if I wanted to go to a restaurant (or any "adult" place) - period, full stop. No toys, no whining, no squirming, (and definitely) no running around or even leaving your seat without permission (and even then, only to go to the bathroom). But that was also how things worked at our meals at home, so for me, I was good to go at an early age.

While I would never hold my parents up as model child raisers (the stories I could tell), they had one trick worthy of emulation ...

On those (infrequent) occasions when my siblings and I went out with the folks to a shmancy eatery, the conversation in the car on our way to the place was filled with how fortunate Mom and Dad were to have kids who knew how to behave in such a grownup atmosphere. Not everybody was so blessed, they informed us.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I never went to a restaurant with tablecloths until I was well into my twenties, so I have no idea how kids behaved in such places when I was young. But I can tell you that it wasn't until the postwar era that "restaurants" became any kind of a family thing at all, as a response to the baby-boomer era. Prewar restaurants were not places where you would find children -- unless they were working there. As customers, with the notable exception of hotel dining rooms, they weren't welcome in most restaurants more developed than a drugstore counter, a one-arm lunchroom or a roadside hamburger, chicken, or barbecue stand, their presence wasn't encouraged or accomodated, and only on the rarest of occasions would you ever see a kid in one.

 

[MisterCairo]

Cassette-drive cleaning.

That should be in the vintage things that have disappeared thread! Man, did your post bring back memories of those cleaning tapes and fluid. Same with VCRs...

 

[MisterCairo]

Drivers who, seeing the car in front of them slow down to turn, etc., feel they now have the right to swerve into my lane, regardless that my car occupies the space they need to avoid having to actually apply their own brakes and SLOW DOWN.

I've nearly been forced off the road twice in the last week, once with both my girls in the vehicle.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Drivers who, seeing the car in front of them slow down to turn, etc., feel they now have the right to swerve into my lane, regardless that my car occupies the space they need to avoid having to actually apply their own brakes and SLOW DOWN.

I've nearly been forced off the road twice in the last week, once with both my girls in the vehicle.

Maybe, such people got Crystal Meth even in their gas-tank?

 

[2jakes]

Say it ain’t so!

 

[tonyb]

Drivers who, seeing the car in front of them slow down to turn, etc., feel they now have the right to swerve into my lane, regardless that my car occupies the space they need to avoid having to actually apply their own brakes and SLOW DOWN.

I've nearly been forced off the road twice in the last week, once with both my girls in the vehicle.

I'm not one to impede traffic (drivers going well under the speed limit in the left lane are engaging in their own brand of anti-social behavior), but I really wish people wouldn't treat driving like a competitive activity. Speeding, tailgating, abrupt lane changes, failing to yield the right of way. People get seriously dead on account of that.

I suppose one way of knowing you ain't a kid no more is actually LIKING the sight of speed enforcement. Cops on motorcycles with radar guns. Oughta be more of it.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Especially on twisty, poorly-maintained two-lane roads such as those which predominate here. Most of our driving is done on Route 1, which is two lanes, repaved every twenty years, is full of blind hills, and features long stretches with no lighting of any kind and random wildlife which can jump out at you at any time. Anyone who thinks that there is ever, under any circumstances, any appropriate time to drive 65 or 70mph on this type of road richly deserves the fate they might very well get. When I'm dictator, every car within the boundaries of Maine will be required to have a governor installed that will prevent any speed above 45mph.

 

[2jakes]

Drivers who use turn signals to change lanes without checking
to make sure that the other
lane is clear.
As if using their turn signal gives them the right to cut in front of
you.