Dear Crabby

Well, no cat drama to report tonight. I guess we'll have to move on to more PRESSING issues...a.k.a. yours.

Dear Crabby,
I have an 8-year-old daughter. She's already quite mature and pretty self-reliant. Anyway, last year, I let her taste my coffee. She LOVED it. Now, she's kind of, um, hooked. I don't really have a problem with it, but people give me really horrible looks when we're out at Starbucks together and she orders a cold press. Is there anything wrong with this, or do other people need to get over themselves?

Thanks,
Uppity about uppers

Dear UAU,
Good work! Your "mature" daughter will have A.D.D. and stunted growth in no time! Where will you collect your Mother of the Year award!? Listen, it's your offspring, not mine, so I can't exactly tell you what to do with your own child. But I can tell you this: You're an idiot. Get that girl a juice box and knock it off. Yes, people give you dirty looks when your daughter orders a double shot of espresso, because your child is A CHILD. She should have a naturally high energy level, so caffeine is just...unnecessary. And everyone knows that no one LIKES the taste of coffee...adults drink it because we stayed up all night worrying about our 401(K) and bank accounts. But whatever. It's your life. Just don't come crying to me being like "Dear Crabby - my daughter is an evil beyotch in the morning and her hands won't stop shaking. What should I do?!" Get yourself a grown up friend to go out for coffee and get the poor girl a babysitter and a Justin Bieber poster and you can just get real.

Dear Crabby,
My best friend from childhood is pregnant. We have both been super excited and buying all kinds of tiny clothes and whatnot. And she let me help her decorate the nursery when her hubby wanted to plaster the whole room in Chicago Bears crap. But last weekend, I kind of got fed up. I had been going through a trauma at work, and when I tried to talk about it with her she totally went silent and blew me off. I know soon-to-be parents are preoccupied and everything, and I'm almost as excited about her baby as she is. But what can I do to get her to listen to ME every once in awhile?

Thanks Crabber,
Sick of Pregnant Pauses

Dear SOPP,
My advice? Honestly? GET NEW FRIENDS FOR THE NEXT, OH, YEAR. Pregnant people - and new parents - somehow assume that just because they are mixing up a little human in their disgusting tummy petri dishes they can completely forget about everything else. They - and their babies - are the new center of the Universe. Maybe part of their brains are dripping through that umbilical cord thing?? Yeah. It's useless, pal. I say keep in touch, help with the nursery or breast feeding or whatever, but at the end of the day, your needs are not being met. You've been temporarily replaced by something that doesn't even have kneecaps yet. So, dip out for awhile. When she can finally drink again, my guess is that she'll come crawling back to you needing to hear some grown-up stuff over a different kind of bottle.

Dear Crabby,
I'm hosting my first Super Bowl party this weekend. I've got roughly four days to pull something together, because I haven't exactly planned anything just yet. I've got a huge TV and that's pretty much all I thought I needed. Then last night some horrible co-worker asked me what I was "serving" at the party. Say what? I don't know! I, like you, don't cook so I just do not want anything annoying. What's the bare minimum of what I need to have?

Thanks, Crabby!
-Super Bowl (of Chips or something)

Hey yo, Super Bowl!
I can't tell...are you a chick or a dude? I'm guessing that because you have a huge TV and can't cook, you are a man. Then again, you called it "hosting" a party and are actually worried about what to have for guests, so you could also be a chick. Whatever. My advice is the same. You'll need pizza or pizza rolls, chips, salsa, some sort of dip with something pseudo-healthy, and maybe like a tube of cookie dough or something. And beer. Lots of beer. If your guests don't drink, though, you'll need all that stuff too. Plus more. Non-drunk people tend to get hungry and antsy at parties. You'll probably need giant supplies of pretzels then. And Chex Mix. Maybe some trail mix. Guacamole. Fruit. Oh, and pop. However, the easiest thing to do would be to get the drinks yourself and make everyone else bring food. Problem: Solved. Yay football!!!!!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand....scene. That concludes this evening's performance of Crappy Advice. For an encore presentation, please tune in next week for another installment. For tickets, email pharonsquare@gmail.com. The End.