As you may know, Young Ladrinka plans to work as a baseball player when he grows up, but in case things don’t go according to plan, he’s been exploring his options. So as we were driving to the ferry to go to Block Island on Sunday, he asked Husbandrinka about the possibility of printing money.
Husbandrinka was against it, because he said that it was illegal, but Young Ladrinka reassured him that no one would know. Then Husbandrinka took what I immediately called a “wrong moral turn” because instead of saying that something is wrong even if no one knows about it, he asked what was the point of printing fake money if you weren’t going to use it. Young Ladrinka then explained that oh, he was going to use it, alright, he just wasn’t going to tell the people that he was passing the money off to that it was fake, so, see, no one would know.
Of course I was very proud because I could see that with this type of logic my son wasn’t going to be appearing on America’s Stupidest And Yet Adorablest Criminals any time soon, but Husbandrinka seemed focused on the small picture, i.e. that it was really hard to get a printer that would make forgery-worthy copies. Young Ladrinka countered that Costco has everything and then we got caught up in a practical quagmire of how exactly we would get it to print on two sides of the page and Young Ladrinka recommended Crazy Glue and my daughter may have mentioned that maybe the glue wasn’t the crazy one in the car.
I was totally exhausted by the whole discussion, and was about to point out that we’d have to be printing bills in the kazillion denominations to make it worth our while, but then in the nick of time I realized that this was one of those dreaded teaching moments that parenting magazines are always harping about, so I said “or you could also study hard in school and get a job and work hard and earn the money.”
Young Ladrinka didn’t love my suggestion as much as I expected him to. But he did reassure me with a “don’t worry, I’ll probably just play in the Major Leagues!” so whew that THAT crisis was averted.
Although rest assured, he has a bright academic career ahead of him. Even though he talks back to the math workbooks:
Apparently, he hasn't been practicing spelling "Totally"
One year ago ...
- Update from Vacation - 2009
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
My Jack talks back to his mathbooks too! 🙂
i agree with ladrinka in regards to math, not the printing money scam. i failed algebra II and still graduated. not sure how that happened. enjoy block island. hope you bought some of those motion-sickness pills.
Haha! Totaly not true, indeed! No amount of math tutors could help me in that department. I suck at math and that’s why I don’t understand the value of a dollar. I’m excited to start it all over again, though – having a child in senior kindergarten and one who will begin in 2 years is exciting for me because I get to do math homework all over again! 🙂
I finally found my way to your blog! Can’t wait to read you daily as I was privileged to do in the the awaiting-Sara-Grace era! You never fail to amuse and inspire me!
Blessings!
Annie
Twitter: slowpanic
August 24, 2010 at 5:07 pm
Yeah, after about five minutes of helping my kid with homework I’m talking to my kids books too. totaly.
Thats better than my bff’s kid. He wants to be a bum, cause ppl just walk by and give you shit and you dont have to work. This is his life goal at 10 years of age.
or he wouldnt mind going to jail cause its a free place to eat and sleep.
Hes got it all figured out dont you know. SHe must be sooo proud.
Well, by next summer he will figure out that robing banks makes more sense then robing houses; and when the puberty will be in full bloom rolling grand mother to the cliff will sound like a great idea.
You should compare him to the Lomborso atlas.
Good luck and have good time.
This was a very funny post, but I must say I enjoyed Papa’s “rolling grand mother to the cliff” idea most of all.
Ah, this early financial training is priceless!
I am going to have to ban myself from reading your blog when I’m in a public place because I just end up giggling at my computer screen & invariably people give me that side-eyed look like “um, crazy person at 10 o’clock.”
Dream big, Young Ladrinka. Dream big!
Twitter: debontherocks
August 25, 2010 at 2:05 pm
The details kill you. Lucrative as it is, I refuse to cook meth anymore because, hello, the cooking. Tedious. Hot. Entirely overrated.
Can he print some for me? I’ll pay him… with this… let me see what I have here… yes! these lovely “real” Shekels I found lying around here. Yes.
Twitter: osnsmom
August 25, 2010 at 7:40 pm
When I was a young lass, I thought about printing money. It just seemed logical to me. Not because of greed or anything, but hey, you need money, you make it yourself! It’s proactive. Too bad things don’t work that way in America.
6 loves to draw pictures of me and scribble them out when he’s pissed. I guess money laundering comes next…