Tag Archive for: poop

The squatter

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Mid-squat

We came, we saw, we did Disneyland and nobody had sensory overload. I’ll write more about that in the next few days. Today, however, the focus is on something far more fascinating: Our squatting baby.

Yes, the very same baby you see in the photo here to the right. One minute she’s running around like a chicken evading slaughter. The next minute, she screeches to a halt, squats at the knees and pushes a poop into her Size 4 diaper.

This scene played itself out at least two or three times daily during out weekend in the House that Mickey Built. Baby G squatted and pooped her way through two airports, two theme parks, Downtown Disney, and the walk back to our hotel (which was about 1.2 miles from the park entrance). And she seemed to enjoy it more and more each time she pulled it off—donning a mischievous smile every time.

After the third or fourth squatting incident, I started wondering what must have been going through Baby G’s mind. Wandering around Adventureland? Let me squat here, you guys. Waiting in the queue for the Teacup ride? No problem, I’ll just squeeze it out here.

Part of me can’t blame my youngest (or any kid, for that matter) for going on the go. I’m the kind of guy who hates wasting time, and I’ve always envied babies for their ability to do business in motion. No matter how many times you read in “The Bathroom Reader,” the place is a time vortex. Diapers vanquish that.

The other part of me thinks the kid’s antics are flat-out ridiculous; her own little way of getting comfortable with her little body and asserting control over the rest of us.

Whatever the scoop, after a weekend of squats and poops, one thing is certain: Baby G is quite a ham.

Diaper-Changing on Airplane Seats: Just Plain Gross

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These + floor = Peace. For now.

These + floor = Peace. For now.

I’m the first person to admit the way most airlines treat families these days is atrocious. I’d also be among the first parents to start chanting obscenities at said airlines for denying us basic necessities such as changing tables in the lavatories of commercial flights. Heck, some people have called me a “tiger father” for my in-your-face perspective on the subject.

That said, let me get one thing very clear: Changing diapers full of urine and fecal matter on surfaces where other humans have to sit is just plain wrong.

Perhaps this explains why I’ve had such a hard time digesting a recent essay on The Daily Beast by author Philip Shishkin. I *want* to love the piece. In it, Shiskin recounts a horrific series of events on a flight with his baby daughter from Washington, D.C. to San Francisco. (The Twitter version: Father’s outrage over airline’s chronic inability to treat family travelers w/respect ends with flight crew calling the cops. Seriously.)

That the pilot called the po-po on this guy is atrocious. The fact that a flight attendant told the guy to change his kid on the floor is awful (I know; I’ve been there and done that). Heck, I even second Shiskin’s outrage over airlines discontinuing early boarding for families.

But to muster an ounce of sympathy for a guy who brazenly admits to changing his kid on the flight attendant jump seats—then gets all indignant about it? I just can’t.

Why do fellow parents think it’s OK to change dirty diapers in plane seats anyway? It’s not OK for grownups to drop trou to conduct No. 1 or 2 in the middle of the airplane cabin, so why would we think it’s OK to change our kids there?

Put yourself in other people’s shoes. If, in mid-change, your neighbor’s half-naked kid went all Old Faithful on you, don’t you think you’d be—wait for it—pissed? If you were a solo traveler, traveling for business in your best suit, wouldn’t you poo-poo a seat smeared with poop?

On a more basic level, if you were in the middle of a six-hour flight, how would you feel about unintentionally getting up close and personal with (or within smelling distance of) diarrhea?

The bottom line: Seats are for sitting in; bathrooms are for tending to excrement.

As sad as it is that some airlines no longer provide changing tables in on-board lavatories, changing dirty diapers where other people sit should never be an alternative.

If the author of this piece had followed the rules (i.e., changed his kid on the floor) and quietly aired his grievances through appropriate channels, I’m guessing he wouldn’t have had his little run-in with the law.

(He probably also would have gotten some travel vouchers, FWIW.)

Sure, we family travelers want to change the way airlines treat us when we fly, but to accomplish this, we must operate within the confines of the current system—no matter how ridiculous those confines might be. Listen to flight attendants. Respect fellow passengers whenever possible. And please, y’all, don’t be a Shishkin.