Please keep your kids away from me

[Scritzy]

Which was why I left. I was so angry, I knew whatever I would have said would have been rude.  However I did have visions of keeping a mouse trap in my purse for a while....

Evil Scritzy likes that vision.

[Ehelldame]

The funniest - and most pathetic - display of this family's discipline (or lack thereof) was when we were at a farm. The daughter, who was about 5 at the time, went into the cow pasture. Cows are generally harmless, but they are big, so DD stands there, bothering the cows, and mom and dad are pleading with her to come out of the pasture. They didn't go in after her. She ignored them and they eventually got tired of pleading with her. The kids are teenagers now, and I wonder how they turned out. Not good, I'm guessing.

Actually cattle are very dangerous.  We handreared a 3 day old orphan and sold her at 18 months/600 pounds (hardly full size) because she had become too dangerous even though she was considered to be trained and acclimated to humans.  The unexpected kicks from a leg that can strike in every direction and the head butts were the biggest issues. 

[behindbj]

I was thinking the same thing - even at my size, I was knocked down by a cow that swung its head unexpectedly.

And most of you know what size I am.

behindbj

[Ehelldame]

I'd like to remind everyone that in threads like these, there is a temptation to seque into divisive topics such as the attitudes of parents towards the child-free or the child-free about parents or rants about children just because they are children.   

Stay on topic of the specific issues of bad behavior and ill manners, please. 

[Scritzy]

That's why I like my cows behind fences (or in petting zoos).

Lyle Lovett got his leg crushed by his pet cow, Cotton, while trying to pull the bovine away from Lyle's uncle.

I often wonder if Cotten's name was changed to T Bone.

[behindbj]

Bwaahaahaahaahaahaahaaa!

*ahem*

Now - that just was not very nice.

Ok - it was funny.

But not very nice.

But it was still funny.

behindbj

[jaxsue]

Thanks for the cow posts. You're right - that girl could have been hurt badly. That makes her parents' pleading even more pathetic!

[Lizmo]

I work as a supervisor at an amusement park that sells passes that people can get to use for unlimited access for the whole season.  You need to get your picture taken for your ID, and it can get really, really crowded in that building.  It is sooooo annoying when families come in with NO CONTROL over the little ones, and it happens quite often.  I remember one family with 4 kids who were crawling under the curtain that hangs from the tables the computers are on, rolling around in our chairs, throwing golf pencils at each other, running into employee only areas, and SCREAMING...and the parents just ignored it.  Not to mention there were other people in the room, and I was dealing with a guest situation at the time.  It's hard to explain something to a confused guest when kids are screaming. 

Also, we were at a pro football game a few weeks ago, and there was a little boy who was probably around ten standing ont he stairs in the isle the whole time.  He was being fairly annoying, but so were the drunk people behind us, so can't blame him for that.  It's a football game.  But there were NO parents around.  Still not sure who he belonged to...

[Rei-chan]

When I was a manager at a "family" restaurant, we always had parents that would come in with large groups of kids (example:  party of 10, but 4 adults, 6 kids) and want to sit at separate tables.   At first, I didn't think too much of it, as when I was a kid, my parents would take me and my friends or cousins out to eat, and we would sit at a nearby table and play "grown up" and my parents tipped accordingly.  However, it seems that now, some parents use this as a babysitting service and ignore the "kids table". 

It finally came down to us putting together a policy that the kids would be seated with the adults or the party did not come in.  The kicker was a group that ignored the kids behavior, even when they were throwing food, silverware, knocking over each others drinks on purpose, and driving the other patrons crazy.  I ended up having to reprimand the kids and then speak to the parents, who stiffed the server (who then had to clean the section they were in, although we all pitched in and helped).

Its one of the reasons I am out of food service now.....

[ZipTheWonder]

just because a parent doesn't feel something is wrong doesn't mean the people around the child who have to deal with it aren't annoyed by it.

People annoy me all the time.   I don't expect them to accommodate my particular annoyances, nor do I try to correct their beahvior -- adult or child.

[kherbert05]

When I was a manager at a "family" restaurant, we always had parents that would come in with large groups of kids (example:  party of 10, but 4 adults, 6 kids) and want to sit at separate tables.   At first, I didn't think too much of it, as when I was a kid, my parents would take me and my friends or cousins out to eat, and we would sit at a nearby table and play "grown up" and my parents tipped accordingly.  However, it seems that now, some parents use this as a babysitting service and ignore the "kids table". 

It finally came down to us putting together a policy that the kids would be seated with the adults or the party did not come in.  The kicker was a group that ignored the kids behavior, even when they were throwing food, silverware, knocking over each others drinks on purpose, and driving the other patrons crazy.  I ended up having to reprimand the kids and then speak to the parents, who stiffed the server (who then had to clean the section they were in, although we all pitched in and helped).

Its one of the reasons I am out of food service now.....

I remember one time we went out and had reservations for our group of maybe 20+ including 3 teen age cousins and 6 grade school cousins. The restaurant ended up seating us in 3 tables. The parents/grandparents at one. 3 teenage cousins and our 20 something uncles at another. Finally the 6 grade school kids at the third. We knew that if we misbehaved the wrath of God would be merciful compared to what our parents would do. Even so, our parents left a huge tip., because the staff checked with them before refilling our sodas. If we had thrown food - we would have been scrubbing that restaurant on our hands and knees.

[sammycat]

Years ago I was at Sizzler (yes, I do eat there a lot ), and the centre of the restaurant was taken up with a group of about 30 people, probably half were adults and the rest primary school aged children.  The children seemed to be seated predominantly down one end.

I have never been so disgusted in my life at the behaviour of people in a restaurant.  These kids ran around the tables, crawled under the tables, across the chairs, threw food, ground food it into the carpet, shrieked and just carried on in general like savages.  Not one single adult at that table made a move to control or discipline those kids.  It's as though the adults weren't even there.  The other diners and I just stared at each other, we were so amazed.  I think we were too shocked to think straight as we should have gotten managemen involved.  Why the staff didn't evict them I don't know.  We were there for about 30 minutes after the savages finally left and the staff were still trying to clean up the mess as were were leaving.

After my recent experience at Sizzler with the screaming toddler, I phoned the restaurant to ask if there was a policy in place for asking unruly patrons to leave and apparently there isn't.  The manager I spoke to said they do ask people to restrain their children from running around the restaurant but the normal response they get to that is foul language or abuse from the diner.  In addition, patrons apparently will also then throw food on the floor, grind it into the carpet and tell staff that now they have something else to clean up.

My mind just boggles.

[Venus193]

My mind also boggles, but I think I understand what's going on.  The restaurant is afraid of a lawsuit from these Breederzillas who will rant about the emotional trauma to their little Pwecious for being evicted from a public place.

I have a solution:  Keep a videocamera handy for evidence at the civil trial.

[sammycat]

I have a solution:  Keep a videocamera handy for evidence at the civil trial.

I do alway have a camera in my bag, and it does have a video function on it......

[Venus193]

Just make sure it's date-stamped for something like that.