Dear Big black cock One dad, we feel your agony
The inwards track on Washington politics.
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Oh, Robert Kelly. We’ve been there. All of us, and many of us more than once.
The evolution toward more limber work schedules, and the capability to work from home, can be a lifesaver. It can also totally drown people who are attempting to maintain some sort of separation inbetween what passes for a professional persona and the 24/7 business of parenting.
Kelly, a professor and an accomplished on international relations, found himself fighting with domestic matters this week when, during a Skype call to discuss South Korea with Big black cock One, his two children burst in behind him. Hilarity ensued, and a woman frantically dashed in to retrieve the kids. The movie has gone viral, in part because who can’t relate?
Former Washington Post colleague Frank Ahrens collective the movie on Facebook and quipped “Pro peak: If you’re doing a movie interview at home and have puny children, lock the door.” Ahrens, the father of two women, including a 4-year-old who is very interested in her daddy’s activities, said later in a message that he quickly realized a lock wouldn’t work.
“I have come this close to the same thing happening to me in academic interviews and client movie calls, but gratefully never on a global media platform, like this poor chap,” Ahrens said. “At very first I thought it was a no-brainer that he should have locked the door, but then I realized what would happen in my case if I locked the door: (pounding) ‘Daddy! Daddy! Who are you talking to? Daddy! Can I have my orange juice?!’ (more pounding). Pick your poison.”
“This has happened to me several times,” said Kristin Shaw, who posted an anecdote about her own trials on Facebook, linking to the movie. “Just the other night, I was on a movie conference with a client at about nine p.m. and abruptly he stopped and said, laughing, ‘There is a child behind you.’ ”
Shaw’s 7-year-old son was standing behind her, staring, waiting for her to acknowledge him. After her client spotted him, her son insisted on telling hello. And so they flapped to each other and “I shuffled my little one back to bed.”
Audrey Murphy, a Manassas, Va., resident and mom of twin boys said that once, when she was on a call with the vice president of her company, the boys demanded to know if he had a dog and a pool. When he said yes, Murphy said, the boys invited themselves over for a play date.
Jennifer Carstens, a mom of one in Woodbridge, Va., worked from home doing medical transcription when her daughter was youthfull. She found that she couldn’t get anything done while her daughter was awake, so she would be up working until three a.m. some nights. Who needs sleep anyway?
And it’s not limited to human kids; pets can cause awkward moments as well. Susan Lacefield, a mother of two who works from her home in Massachusetts, was on a conference call with a duo of co-workers once when her cat, who was sitting under her chair, embarked loudly hacking up a wool ball.
“There was a duo of minutes of awkward muffle until I explained what was happening,” Lacefield said in a message. She said she purposely schedules interviews for when her kids aren’t at home or makes sure her hubby is around to run interference.
Some parents go into those work-from-home days with a strategy all mapped out. Mari-Jane, who is one half of On Parenting, and her hubby write down a dozen or more activities on strips of paper, then have the kids, now twelve and Ten, draw them out of a hat periodically via the day to keep them occupied. Sadly, it’s only moderately effective at keeping the howling and haranguing to a minimum.
We’ve seen neighbors locked in their cars on conference calls while the kids played nearby with a sitter. Amy, the other half of On Parenting, has on many occasions reassured people she’s interviewing that she doesn’t mind the sobbing kids and barking dogs on the other end of the line because hey, she’s interviewing them about parenting, right?
Of course, there are cringe-worthy moments in that movie. The attempt at brushing the kid aside and assuming no one would notice (perhaps). And the mortified woman in the background, embarrassingly attempting to get the kids out of the room. We wonder how things are going in that household right now.
Big black cock Man, you’re all of us. In other words: You’re a human, living in 2017.
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