You know you've hit the point when nothing phases you anymore when you can walk up to the customer..

[HopeHoops]

... service counter at the grocery store and ask a pretty young woman in her early 20's for a mechanical baby doll diaper that was dropped by the eggs and yogurt.

It's sort of like that point where you no longer drive to another town to guy condoms.

Here's the deal: Our high school requires all 11th graders to spend a weekend with a mechanical baby doll. They have to wear an escape-proof wrist band to prove they're in close proximity at all times (although there is a baby sitting band that can be used for short periods like shower time). It comes with a bottle and two diapers. Everything is connected by some form of wireless communication and the baby simulates stuff babies do - sleeping, wanting to be fed, wanting to be rocked, needing a diaper change - but FORTUNATELY not actually ejecting fluids or solids from either end.

So we're in the grocery store back by the eggs and the baby makes the diaper change noise. Rather than going to the rest room to use the Koala changing table, my daughter decides to do an in-air diaper change. TA-DA. We get to the register and an old woman asks about the baby. She explains that it is a school project, for practice and the woman asks if she's pregnant. She explains that EVERYONE has to do it. I view it as a means of birth control - spending a week with it in the HOUSE makes me feel like hiding from sex.

The woman at the checkout graduated with my eldest daughter four years ago. She was talking to my youngest about how she lost one of the diapers on the bus on the way home - they give the kids the dolls on a Friday. In a panic, she called the teacher but there was just no way to shut the damn thing up so she stuffed it under a bunch of clothes in her closet.

So, we're about 3/4 of the way home (with frozens) and the baby starts bitching. Guess what - NO EXTRA DIAPER! As soon as we made it home, my wife and daughter worked on unloading the van while I called the store manager. As soon as he understood, he put me on hold and within 15 minutes he picked up and said he found it back by the eggs, right where I thought it might be. Damn that was fast, but then he was probably thinking, "E-GADS! There's what looks like a dirty diaper on the floor by the eggs! What will the customers think?!?!?"

So I drive back, there's the aforementioned pretty young woman at the counter everywhere and I ask for a baby doll diaper. She retrieved it and I walked out. Like what the hell else is there to do? Sigh.

[Shagbark Hickory]

1. That's funny!

The project does sounds like a very good idea to me though.

[pacalo]

2. Cute story, HH!

It's nice to have reached the age where nothing seems to embarrass us anymore. Just another trip to the grocery store to pick up a dirty diaper...


:hi:

[GreenPartyVoter]

3. We only had sacks of flour. I think the new dolls are cool, and provide a much

more realistic experience.

[HopeHoops]

5. At least they don't pee. For SOME reason, they actually DO sell dolls that pee. Go figure.

[GreenPartyVoter]

8. I had a pee doll when I was tiny, but you had to squeeze her hard to get anything to happen. LOL

[luv_mykatz]

4. K & R

Great project, and pretty cool story. :)

[Gormy Cuss]

6. So your daughter learned that when she screws up as a parent, Gramps will clean up the poo?

:rofl:

I don't grok these "fake baby" projects. I guess that nowadays since so few teens babysit or have young siblings they're a bit isolated from the overwhelming responsibility of having a baby.

[HopeHoops]

7. I think the idea is to scare them out of even THINKING about having sex.

[Chan790]

9. I always buy condoms at the store next to my apartment...

sometimes I even draw attention to the fact I'm buying condoms. I like the message it sends to my neighbors and friends.

I'm getting laid!!

I think of it as something to brag about.

Now I'd drive to the much-more-anonymous Target inside the Mall where I can check-out "drugstore" purchases at the Pharmacy counter where there are no other people if I ever had to buy that KY "Yours and Mine" crap...that'll be a low day in life when I need a "stimulating" additive to my lube to get my lady-friends off.

Oh yeah...I hate those dolls. They should make it easier to take out the batteries...I mean all you need to make a real baby STFU! is some rum. :evilfrown:

[HopeHoops]

12. Hell, I haven't needed them since the big V 16 years ago - now I buy them for my daughters.

It isn't any of my business whether or not they're having sex, but if they're going to have it, PUT A DAMN RUBBER ON IT!

[HopeHoops]

10. Too late to edit the message. As someone pointed out to me in a PM, I should have used "fazes",...

...not "phases". Oops.

[JohnnyLib2]

11. Hah! Sort goes with the theme of "reaching the point."

As a family member once said, "oh well, we've outlived the English teacher."

[quakerboy]

17. Thanks for that

I'm gonna have to remember that one..

[LynneSin]

13. Is that East Penn that does that?

:shrug:

[HopeHoops]

14. Yes, but I think some of the other districts do as well.

My youngest will be the only of the three girls to make it through all of kindergarten to graduation at EP. The middle one almost qualified, but we moved into the area when she was in the middle of kindergarten so she just missed it by half a year. She graduated in June. The eldest went from half of 2nd to graduation and is a junior in college now.

[LynneSin]

15. Not Susquenita - most of our graduates practice with the real thing

:eyes:

[HopeHoops]

16. So funny I forgot to laugh.

But yeah, Perry county does have a little bit of a problem there. At least they don't suffer from Palinitis.

[SwampG8r]

18. my wife is a nurse midwife and

she sees a lot of girls for what is basically their first visit
she says the best birth control in the world is a baby
if you are 14-18 and you get a real baby dropped on you for a week its more effective than norplant

[Xithras]

19. My daughter had one of those her sophomore year.

When the project was over, the teacher plugged the doll into a computer and it generated a printout of her parenting skills during the week.

She'd broken the babies neck ELEVEN times.

It's interesting that yours required a wristband. My daughters simply had an RFID fob that had to be in proximity, because the assignment didn't actually require her to watch it. As long as SOMEONE had it, they were fine. This actually gave my daughter a great insight into parenthood: One day during the project she came in and asked my wife and I whether we'd watch "the baby" so she could go hang out with her friends. We both told her no, which set off a whiny and tearful, "But you're supposed to help me! You're ruining my life! I can't do ANYTHING with this babydoll!" To which my wife swiftly replied, "We aren't interested today. Pay a babysitter. Oh, and welcome to parenthood."

I don't know whether it was just the doll or not, but to this day she swears that she's going to live child-free. She has no interest in being a parent.