Kid's Birthday Party Gift Bags

Do you know what I hate?

It's kid's party gift bags.

There used to be a time when you as a kid were invited to a birthday party and you (your parents) would shell out for a gift for the lucky bastard getting older. The parents of the birthday child would shell out a few bucks for a birthday cake - maybe they would take the kids out to go bowling or some other activity, but often enough the kids would all hang around the house playing board games just having fun.

But no longer. Not only does the family of the parents have to organize an activity where they can rent a room outside their house, but they also have to pony up cash to purchase gift bags for all of the kids who came to the party!

What the hell is that? The Oscars? Cannes?

When did it come to this? Where kids EXPECT to receive a present just for showing up to a birthday party?!

And it's not just a simple gift bag! No! Parents are now out to outdo one another, with grander and grander gifts filled with more crap, tissue paper and a fancy gift bag to give to a six-year-old who could care less!

On many an occasion, the amount of stuff in the gift bag far exceeded the $20 limit we spent on a present for the birthday child! 

When did it become less about having a pizza slice, some cake, and singing happy birthday to a friend?

When did it also have to become about giving presents to the guests to thank them for coming?

I'm not a rich guy. But when it comes to my son who will be turning seven in December - there's no expense I wouldn't spare to make sure he's happy! But why do I also have to impress his friend's parents?

I don't.

I want to go on record that I have never purchased gift bags for any of my son's friends when they come to a party.

And you know what? The kids don't care. The important thing for them was that they had a good time.

Rather than taking everybody out and away from the house to go to a 'games activity' center, I bring in the activity.

Two years ago we brought in a company that carted in some animals that the kids could not only pet - but they were taught about the animals! A blue-tongued skink and I enjoyed each others company as he fell asleep in my arms.While I can't recall the exact company we used - here's a Toronto listing: HERE. I'm sure you can find something similar in your city. Prices were decent for the hour-plus show.

Since my son's birthday is close to Christmas, we bought a few small pre-cooked gingerbread cookie kits and had the kids construct their own - we supplied the icing/glue.

Last year we brought in a company (Bugs Without Borders) that specialized in bugs! I fricking HATE bugs! But there I was petting a giant millipede that normally would have been crunching under my old Adidas!

The kids played with the bugs gently - they learned about the bugs - they even received a small kit from the company that had a bug in it that they could feed and raise. I'm pretty sure ours grew from a maggot and escaped it's plastic cage and later found its way spattered with a bug swatter!

And... while it seems like the kids got a gift - they did - but it wasn't me going out and buying a fancy gift bag filled with junk from a dollar store. Don't get me wrong, dollar stores are great - but kids don't NEED that junk. If they want it, you can but it for them. They don't need it given to them.

I will state that one of Hudson's friends gave his guests a mystery LEGO pack containing a minifigure—Brilliant!—but that's still $5! Multiply that by 12 kids and that's... let's see... twenty plus the square root of my blood-pressure... a lot of money! Money that need not be spent - especially after having spent money on the party proper!

This year - no gift bags again. We are taking two of his best friends out to Medieval Times here in Toronto. They can have food without forks, all the mead they can drink, can watch some great jousting and sword battles and maybe dad can slap a wench on the ass.

Stop the insanity. No more gift bags. Who the hell do we need to impress? No one. Just your own kid(s).

Gift bags, my ass.

Do you know what I hate?

Kid's birthday party gift bags.

Summer

Do you know what I hate? Summer.

I know that sounds ridiculous, but along with the nice hot sunny days and the opportunity to wear shorts, see women in skimpy apparel, and the chance to get a nice tan, there are also a plethora of negatives.

For example: the women in skimpy apparel. As a man... am I allowed to look? If so, how long am I allowed to look? And, since I am 46-year-old, what is that magic number regarding a woman that should prevent me from looking at a women?

Am I allowed to look at a 19-year-old woman? She's old enough to be my daughter and could quite possible the daughter of a woman I slept with. She's an adult, looks nice... can I look without being a dirty old man? I suppose that's why I have a great pair of sunglasses.

Sun tans... sure we all look good with them, but as we have been told ad nauseum these past 30+ years, sun tanning can cause skin cancer... melanoma. Who wants to go out in the sun and get cancer? I do, I do! Nowadays you have to slather on suncreen 101 which if I am correct comes with a suit of lead armour. Sure I can't feel the sun directly on my skin, but I sure feel baked from within my lead shielding.

The smells... I now have an 80 minute commute to work everyday, after my daily work magazine was sold to another company, that god-bless them, has its offices in the middle of nowhere. That's my only knock against this new company, by the way. But, I now have two bus rides and a subway ride. I don't know about you, but I don't smell.... and if I think I might, I have a shower, always using deodorant. It's like brushing my teeth or wearing my seatbelt... it's just something I do automatically.

But apparently, the rest of Toronto is not in agreement with me. The unwashed masses smell. The subway and buses smell... if it's not body odour, it's men believing the AXE commercials will help them get laid if they slather on the body spray, or the women who actually leave a snail slime trail when they walk because they have doused themselves in too much perfume. I am undecided which offends me more... smelling too nice or smelling like they have lice.

I also hate summer because here in Toronto it gets quite humid during the day, and we often get thunder and lightning storms in the evening - just as I'm leaving work. I have no idea how to dress anymore. How do the skimpy-dressed women do it? And why don't I see them when it's raining? I hate not seeing skimpy-dressed women when it's raining.

But my bigger hates for summer come from the great outdoors. I hate bugs. I am bug-bait! Mosquitoes love my sweet blood. I'm often the only one at a party who gets bit... I think that's why they invite me, because it sure ain't for my sunny disposition and lead-covered skin.

Giant flying ants, spiders, flies... just buzz off and die. I hate not knowing where my fly-swatter is!

I also hate Fridays in Toronto. Have you ever driven on a highway on a Friday afternoon? It's a deadstop. Everyone is going to the cottage. I'm not, but I still get caught in the traffic jams. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it!

And let's not forget that summer is also know as construction season. Forget about the idiot who has bought the house across the street from me and has torn it down and has a crew there from 7AM to 7PM constructing a newer, larger, mansion... forget the noise, the plethora of construction vehicles and the construction workers who part their F-150s illegally on the wrong side of the street making backing out of my driveway a near impossibility... no forget that.

Forget about the City of Toronto digging up and replacing water lines on my street at the same time, and on the main street as well, disrupting traffic, delaying my bus so that I miss the connection to my other bus... no... forget that.

Forget that all highway and road maintenance work is done in the summer - taking out lanes and causing further traffic snarl-ups... no forget that.

What I really hate is that summer is also the time when every freaking organization has a bike-a-thon, a walk-a-thon or a parade, thereby closing off streets and roads and making travel totally unacceptable.

I'd like to go somewhere and relax for the summer... but I can't travel by car - can't even back out of my driveway somedays! I can't go downtown as the roadways and sidewalks are jammed with people doing good work for some charity, or merely showing off their pride. Hey... I applaud those people and their organizations... I just don't like being personally inconvenienced. I hate it, in fact.

I can't go outside without being lathered in sunscreen or bug spray - which will kill you as well from cancer - probably - so why leave the house?

Sure, I'd like to look at the women, but I don't want to be a pervert.

Do you know what I hate?

The summer.