Hello,
I have an uptight neighbor that consistently makes me babysit his three year old daughter on a 3 times a week weekly basis and he is supremely wound up too tight. He is 40 years old and has never seen an episode of the Simpsons or even tame old cartoons like Spongebob and Rockos Modern Life, for example.
He got called into work a few times not too long ago and knocked on my door asking if it was okay if i babysat his 3 year old daughter. This isn’t weird considering I’ve known both the father for almost 10 years (though never spent much time together with the exception of a few meals and the occasional year community bbq. We’re facebook friends and have called each other up during times or emergencies or if one of us is out of town we each have keys to the others house just for emergencies. There’s trust is what I’m getting at.
Anyhow, I’ve known his daughter all her life and a little while ago he asks if I can babysit her. I say sure and for 5 hours she’s under my care and she’s enjoying herself as I show her the old 90s Spider-Man Cartoon. We also watch Toy Story (which I later find out the father has never seen any of the Pixar films, or the majority of Disney films). Straight to the point the guy is straight up super religious. Like, his God is the center of every thing. Well, he picks up his daughter a little while later and he get so mad that I showed her Toy Story and Spider-Man and says that they don’t own a TV and the only cartoon she’s ever watched has been VeggieTales. In my head I’m thinking WTF.
Later that week he gives me a 24 hour head notice and asks if I can babysit his daughter again so I say sure because the truth is she’s a joy, is super wonderful with me, and quite honestly has never once cried when I’ve been around, but admittedly I’ve seen she cries and wails at random times when I’m arriving home pulling up to my driveway and I constantly reccuringly see the father and mother having a tough time even getting her out of the seat from their car in their drive way. Btw, the mother works 24/7. She’s like a super alpha woman, runs a super successful business and is part of like every charity in town so needless to say she is busy alllll the time. I do know she spends the mornings making breakfast for the daughter every day before work but after that the mother is off to the rat race every day, including the majority of weekends. The husband works at the local church and has more time off but not all the time. In fact, when he asked if I could babysit his daughter the emergency he had to attend to was due to something church related. This thread isn’t to pick at what he considers more important than his daughter(as I’m left wondering also why he couldn’t just take his daughter to the church) but the point I want to stay on topic with this thread is the question I’m posting in the thread title.
So anyway back to the story, he gives me 24 hour notice and I say sure I’ll babysit again. I have popcorn ready for her and even bought her a VeggieTales toy that the father thought was nice of me but when he dropped her off he told me in a stern tone, no Spider-Man cartoons.
Instead I show her an episode of PBS Arthur and also an episode of Pokémon. Just like the Spider-Man cartoons prior she was glued to the TV and didn’t make a fuss at all. When the father came to pick her up I mentioned both cartoons and again was upset at her having watched Arthur but not at Pokémon. I told
him that he’s making too big a deal of this to which he responds that he would prefer she doesn’t watch TV if I babysit her again. Honestly I’m not going to play house with her for 7 hours straight (I work from home sometimes) cause that would be draining. But again, the little girl is a joy and a part of me feels sad that she’s on lockdown to this degree.
Well, he gives me a schedule for the following week and asks if I can babysit her for 3 days in a row and now he tells me that his daughter is raving at how much fun she has when I babysit her, and mentions the popcorn, the chocolate milkshakes and even Nintendo 64 Mario Kart games we’ve played prior.
So, he drops of her again and I put on Powerpuff Girls and Spongebob Squarepants. She’s quiet as a lamb just enjoying the cartoon and I’m sitting nearby on my iPhone watching a Charlie Rose interview on YouTube about some survivor that was lost at sea for a few weeks. She notices I’m not watching the cartoons with her and asks what I’m watching on my phone. I tell her that it’s an interview between two adults about someone that had to survive in harsh conditions out in the ocean and this is where for the next hour she continuously asks WHY over and over again about the topic of the man lost at see. She was curious about why the man even went to the ocean in the first place and why he didn’t have a boat with him and why he didn’t have enough food or why his boat ran out of power and why he couldn’t just call someone to pick him up and so on and so on. I obviously omitted the intense details to her such as the guy having to give himself an enema and stuff like that and I kept it totally PG but she wanted to know more and more about why he couldn’t just catch fish easily and why the mans parents couldn’t just rescue him.
Well, when the father came to pick her up I mentioned the cartoons we watched and also mentioned the Charlie Rose interview. He seemed befuddled as to the Charlie’s Rose interview (she didn’t watch the interview but she saw me watching it on my phone and kept asking questions while the interview played with one earbud still in my ear). I told him that she kept asking WHY questions over and over and that she was inquisitive and am glad he trusts me to care for her for a few hours here and there. Again I’ve known this way before he had a kid or even got married. (Don’t know the wife super well). I mentioned the cartoons also and he said, ‘No more Spongebob please, too many adult innuendos.’
Well, I know that she is not my daughter but I kinda feel like a little bit of wanting to at least introduce her to some science based kids shows. I’d say old Bill Nye shows from the 90s but considering it’s not a cartoon I’m guessing she’s lose interest after half an episode. My kid is older and is now on video games whenever home but when they were her age they watched movies like Jurassic Park and loved it. I dunno.
I have an uptight neighbor that consistently makes me babysit his three year old daughter on a 3 times a week weekly basis and he is supremely wound up too tight. He is 40 years old and has never seen an episode of the Simpsons or even tame old cartoons like Spongebob and Rockos Modern Life, for example.
He got called into work a few times not too long ago and knocked on my door asking if it was okay if i babysat his 3 year old daughter. This isn’t weird considering I’ve known both the father for almost 10 years (though never spent much time together with the exception of a few meals and the occasional year community bbq. We’re facebook friends and have called each other up during times or emergencies or if one of us is out of town we each have keys to the others house just for emergencies. There’s trust is what I’m getting at.
Anyhow, I’ve known his daughter all her life and a little while ago he asks if I can babysit her. I say sure and for 5 hours she’s under my care and she’s enjoying herself as I show her the old 90s Spider-Man Cartoon. We also watch Toy Story (which I later find out the father has never seen any of the Pixar films, or the majority of Disney films). Straight to the point the guy is straight up super religious. Like, his God is the center of every thing. Well, he picks up his daughter a little while later and he get so mad that I showed her Toy Story and Spider-Man and says that they don’t own a TV and the only cartoon she’s ever watched has been VeggieTales. In my head I’m thinking WTF.
Later that week he gives me a 24 hour head notice and asks if I can babysit his daughter again so I say sure because the truth is she’s a joy, is super wonderful with me, and quite honestly has never once cried when I’ve been around, but admittedly I’ve seen she cries and wails at random times when I’m arriving home pulling up to my driveway and I constantly reccuringly see the father and mother having a tough time even getting her out of the seat from their car in their drive way. Btw, the mother works 24/7. She’s like a super alpha woman, runs a super successful business and is part of like every charity in town so needless to say she is busy alllll the time. I do know she spends the mornings making breakfast for the daughter every day before work but after that the mother is off to the rat race every day, including the majority of weekends. The husband works at the local church and has more time off but not all the time. In fact, when he asked if I could babysit his daughter the emergency he had to attend to was due to something church related. This thread isn’t to pick at what he considers more important than his daughter(as I’m left wondering also why he couldn’t just take his daughter to the church) but the point I want to stay on topic with this thread is the question I’m posting in the thread title.
So anyway back to the story, he gives me 24 hour notice and I say sure I’ll babysit again. I have popcorn ready for her and even bought her a VeggieTales toy that the father thought was nice of me but when he dropped her off he told me in a stern tone, no Spider-Man cartoons.
Instead I show her an episode of PBS Arthur and also an episode of Pokémon. Just like the Spider-Man cartoons prior she was glued to the TV and didn’t make a fuss at all. When the father came to pick her up I mentioned both cartoons and again was upset at her having watched Arthur but not at Pokémon. I told
him that he’s making too big a deal of this to which he responds that he would prefer she doesn’t watch TV if I babysit her again. Honestly I’m not going to play house with her for 7 hours straight (I work from home sometimes) cause that would be draining. But again, the little girl is a joy and a part of me feels sad that she’s on lockdown to this degree.
Well, he gives me a schedule for the following week and asks if I can babysit her for 3 days in a row and now he tells me that his daughter is raving at how much fun she has when I babysit her, and mentions the popcorn, the chocolate milkshakes and even Nintendo 64 Mario Kart games we’ve played prior.
So, he drops of her again and I put on Powerpuff Girls and Spongebob Squarepants. She’s quiet as a lamb just enjoying the cartoon and I’m sitting nearby on my iPhone watching a Charlie Rose interview on YouTube about some survivor that was lost at sea for a few weeks. She notices I’m not watching the cartoons with her and asks what I’m watching on my phone. I tell her that it’s an interview between two adults about someone that had to survive in harsh conditions out in the ocean and this is where for the next hour she continuously asks WHY over and over again about the topic of the man lost at see. She was curious about why the man even went to the ocean in the first place and why he didn’t have a boat with him and why he didn’t have enough food or why his boat ran out of power and why he couldn’t just call someone to pick him up and so on and so on. I obviously omitted the intense details to her such as the guy having to give himself an enema and stuff like that and I kept it totally PG but she wanted to know more and more about why he couldn’t just catch fish easily and why the mans parents couldn’t just rescue him.
Well, when the father came to pick her up I mentioned the cartoons we watched and also mentioned the Charlie Rose interview. He seemed befuddled as to the Charlie’s Rose interview (she didn’t watch the interview but she saw me watching it on my phone and kept asking questions while the interview played with one earbud still in my ear). I told him that she kept asking WHY questions over and over and that she was inquisitive and am glad he trusts me to care for her for a few hours here and there. Again I’ve known this way before he had a kid or even got married. (Don’t know the wife super well). I mentioned the cartoons also and he said, ‘No more Spongebob please, too many adult innuendos.’
Well, I know that she is not my daughter but I kinda feel like a little bit of wanting to at least introduce her to some science based kids shows. I’d say old Bill Nye shows from the 90s but considering it’s not a cartoon I’m guessing she’s lose interest after half an episode. My kid is older and is now on video games whenever home but when they were her age they watched movies like Jurassic Park and loved it. I dunno.
