Theo's ink woes

So last night Theo put this really large, pretty cool looking tattoo on his neck. Before anyone things this is another of my bad dad posts, it's a "temporary" tattoo. The quotes are there because they seem to hang around for over a months :P

Anyway, it is shaped sort of like the wings pins that you used to get from American Airlines when you were a kid flying. He's got the center of it over his adam's apple, and the wings extending around to be underneath his ears. I wish I'd gotten a picture this morning. He was quite proud of it and strutted around all evening.

This morning he woke up and decided he was too embarrassed to go to school with it on. So he asked me to take it off. I have no idea how to do that, and tried to soak it off with warm water to no avail. It was a classic moment of failing to see the consequences of an action, and learning later that he has to think things through. I imagine it won't make any difference though :P

And then there's Riley--she put about 20 tattoos on herself a few months back and had no embarrassment wearing them no matter where we went.

And then there's me--all my tattoos under my t-shirt on my back and I regret not being able to show them to people without coming off as some kind of nutjob. "Wanna see my back???"

Bad Dad!

So this morning I did something with Theo that might not be good parenting. But you know what? I just don't care.

While we were waiting in the car for the bus to arrive--5 degrees out there--he told me that he doesn't like to ride the bus because there's a girl who calls him 'fishbreath' everyday and she's mean to him.

So my first response was the correct parenting response--just ignore her. He said that he does ignore her, but she still does it and it hurts his feelings. So I told him that he shouldn't let what she says hurt his feelings because she's clearly not a nice person and her opinion shouldn't matter at all. He didn't seem reassured by that, and after a moment of considering that advice I realized it was unrealistic. I always had a hard time reacting rationally to that kind of shit, too.

So I ventured out into bad-dad land and told him if, and only if, she called him 'fishbreath' he should look at her, smile in the most friendly way, and say 'Hello, Elephant Ears'. He giggled for a while and seemed excited about getting on the bus, and that made me feel much better.

Until I got home and realized I'd just told him to call names and pick on someone's physical appearance. I felt guilty for a moment. But only a moment. After that moment I wished I could b e a fly on the wall to see how it went, and if it wasn't successful, provide him with another tactic to get the little rugrat off his back.

I wish my Dad would have taught me the art of war when I was a kid :D