You're Grounded for Life: Misguided Parenting Strategies That Sounded Good At the Time

YOU’RE GROUNDED

FOR LIFE

Misguided Parenting Strategies

That Sounded Good at the Time

TIM JONES

Copyright © 2016 Tim Jones.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted by any means—whether auditory, graphic, mechanical, or electronic—without written permission of both publisher and author, except in the case of brief excerpts used in critical articles and reviews. Unauthorized reproduction of any part of this work is illegal and is punishable by law.

In addition, no part of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form by any means without express written permission of The National Football League—no wait, I mean without the express written permission of Tim Jones and View from the Bleachers, who assume no responsibility for omissions or errors, or for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.

Tim Jones is not responsible for any mental or emotional suffering that may be experienced by children or their parents as a result of attempting to apply any of the parenting strategies described in this book. If the reader of this book is unable to distinguish between a serious parenting book with actual, well-researched parenting advice, and this humor publication, the author is not responsible for the fact that the reader apparently must be an idiot.

ISBN: 978-1-4834-4354-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4834-4355-3 (e)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Lulu Publishing Services rev. date: 2/3/2016

Contents

CHAPTER ONE: Early Childhood—Or Oh, Dear. What Have I Spawned?

Warning Signs You May Be Experiencing Kronic Incessant Disorder Syndrome (KIDS)

Always Lie to Your Kids

Kids, Ask Me about God – By Reverend Tornquist

Look, Daddy! I Landed the Space Shuttle!

When it Comes to Our Kids, Winning Isn’t Everything. Whining is….

Encourage Your Challenging Child—Through POSITIVE Parenting

CHAPTER TWO: The Teenage Years—Or As a Matter of Fact the World Does Revolve Around Me, Dad

Who’s the King (or Queen) of Your Castle?

Our Summer Vacation—Only More Interesting

Dr. Tim, Help Me!

My Daughter Has a Boyfriend….

Turn Left NOW! No, Your OTHER Left!! The Joys of Teaching Your Teenager to Drive.

Are All Teenage Daughters Evil?

Meet the World’s Smartest Person: My Teenage Daughter

CHAPTER THREE: Off to College—Or Dear Dean of Students, Please Keep My Child

Four Strategies for Saving for Your Kids’ College Education

My Failsafe Five-Step Strategy to Guarantee Your Kid a Spot in Princeton

College Essentials Packing Checklist…. Item 756: Their Fourth Grade Seashell Collection

Preparing for Life as an Empty Nester (and Hoping for an Occasional Text from My Kids)

A Parent’s Survival Guide for When Your College Kid Comes Home for the Holidays

Lessons in Bonding

My Advice to the Graduating Class: Don’t Tweet Your Junk

Memo to Our Kids: The Family Has Decided to Downsize

CHAPTER FOUR: In Case You Haven’t Learned by Now, Parenting is Futile

If You’re Not a Chinese Tiger Mom, Your Kids Will End Up in Prison

What We WISH We Could Say to Our Kids

Better Parenting Though Polling

Nine Things I Wish I Hadn’t Worried About So Much as a Parent

When it Came to the Journey of Parenthood, I Took a Guilt Trip

Critical Praise for You’re Grounded for Life—Misguided Parenting Strategies That Sounded Good at the Time

If you’re looking for really funny social commentary and clever, thought-provoking insights into this experience we call parenting, all I can say after reading this book is… keep looking. – Deanna Martin, Dallas Evening Star Telegram

There may be well over 50,000 books on parenting, but in my humble opinion, this book by Tim Jones is undoubtedly among the top 49,500—give or take. – Ed Morrison, Pacific Press News Service

Before I read Tim Jones’ book on parenting, I thought most parenting books were just boring, wordy treatises where the writer simply pontificated on how they are an expert without giving any practical, helpful advice whatsoever. But then I read this book. I stand by my previous comment. – Lee Runnells, Harper Conrad Publishing

’Brilliant,’ ‘clever,’ ‘playful,’ ‘insightful,’ ‘informative’ and ‘helpful’ are all words that immediately come to mind when you ask me to list random adjectives with more than one syllable. – Maria Hernandez, English Teacher, Crestview Middle School

At least this book was something to keep him occupied and out of trouble. God knows he’s not qualified to do much of anything else in this world. – Betty Jones (the author’s mother)

"Tim Jones’ book You’re Grounded for Life - Misguided Parenting Strategies That Sounded Good at The Time—What do I think of it? Well, if that’s not a train wreck waiting to happen, I don’t know what is." – Frank Nash, the author’s High School English teacher

Can you get off the computer, Dad? You’ve been hogging it all day. And besides, nobody is really going to read any of this crap anyway. – Rachel Jones, author’s daughter

This book is 100% recyclable and biodegradable! – Ned Witherspoon, Spokesperson, Department of Conservation, Portland, Oregon

Can you tell me how to get to the Space Needle? – Melvin Turnblad, a Seattle tourist whose quote we accidentally placed in this book but did not catch our mistake until after the book went to press

I can’t believe how incredibly, unbelievably awful this drivel is. I sure hope he doesn’t give up his day job. I mean, it’s really horrible. (Note to self: Be sure not to use this quote. This guy really seems to hate me.) – Charlie Mann, Portland Beacon Herald Sun Times Post-Gazette Dispatch

I can’t speak for his writing ability, but to be honest, he sucks at racquetball. Is it okay to say ‘sucks’? – Keith Weinberger, racquetball partner

About the Author, Tim Jones

Tim Jones is perhaps the most brilliant humor writer since Mark Twain. I know that’s pretty high praise, but since the person typing this About the Author section is Tim Jones himself, he pretty much gets to say whatever he wants. And we simply don’t have the budget to hire fact checkers every time Tim puts in writing some outrageous claim which might not be 100% factual. Tim also invented the Internet, not to mention the modern combustion engine and early prototypes of the first central air conditioning system. Oh, and the Clapper. He invented that, too. Tim is currently working on a device that turns urine into 100% safe, potable water but has not been successful in getting any of his friends to test the efficacy of his invention. Tim also wrote the lyrics for the viral hit song Gangnam Style (in the original Korean).

After Tim served two terms as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations, he started humor writing. He writes a weekly humor blog called View from the Bleachers (www.ViewFromTheBleachers.net), which is read by hundreds of millions of people on every continent. He is particularly loved by Norwegians, for reasons unclear, even though ironically, Tim does not particularly care for Norwegians (but he refuses to explain why). Okay, perhaps that was a slight exaggeration about hundreds of millions of readers everywhere. Let’s just say his total readership is somewhere between 12 and 9,000,000 readers. Even more if you include the Internet Spammers who routinely post comments to his articles, like this actual recent quip from one of his anonymous fans: Am not sure where you’re getting your info, but great topic. I needs spend some time learning much more. Thanks for excellent info I was looking for this. The praise does not get much better than that, does it?

Tim writes about a wide variety of issues from parenting to politics to the latest trends in lifestyles—often with nearly perfect punctuation and grammar. Not long ago, Tim was privileged to join the ranks of a very exclusive club. The A.A.R.P. invited him to become one of their very first 80 million elite members. In order to be considered for membership in this exclusive society, one must be over 50 years of age, have a pulse, and go to the bathroom on average at least twice a night. Tim is honored to say he was accepted after only his third application for admission.

Tim is based in Camano Island, WA, a lovely island whose residents were delighted to welcome him to their ranks—until they started reading his weekly humor blog. He is currently on probationary status with the other island residents. In his spare time, Tim plays tennis, golf, racquetball and other sports—none of which he will ever come close to mastering. He is also married to a talented portrait artist and is the father of two wonderful girls he and his wife adopted from China as infants. Without them, this book absolutely would not have been possible.

Dedication

Author’s daughters Emily (top) and Rachel enjoying the snow back when they actually enjoyed hanging out with each other.

I dedicate this book to my amazingly wonderful daughters, Rachel and Emily, without whose endless persistence in attempting to ingest dangerous objects as toddlers, refusing to keep their room clean as teenagers, and a litany of other devious efforts to do everything in their power to push their father to the brink of emotional exhaustion over the past twenty years, this book would not have been possible. I can’t imagine what my life would have been like these past twenty years without both of you in it. And sorry about the 15,000 times I told you, Remember, make good choices. I imagine