Seen and Not Heard I Wish

I like children. The sight of an adorable little child won't melt me into a pile of sticky oozy sweet goo (unless the child is my niece, but I'll spare you and not go there), but I like children. Having said that, I will now add (and I'm CAPS-locking because I feel that strongly about it) CHILDREN DON'T BELONG IN AN OFFICE ENVIRONMENT. I'm not talking about wonderful programs like Bring-Your-Child-to-Work day. Usually, there is a planned agenda for them, which will, hopefully, keep them interested and occupied. I'm talking about the practice of bringing small children, aged 4, to work and somehow expecting them to miraculously behave. It won't happen. Offices are dull places for children. There's nothing to do, no games to play, no other kids to play with, no Sesame Street to watch, and when you're that young you have the attention span of--well of a 4-year-old.

By now, it should be rather apparent that I'm speaking of a specific person who occasionally brings her son to work. I genuinely sympathize with her situation. She's a work-study graduate student, and since school is out for the semester, she doesn't get the free child care. It's a difficult situation compounded by the fact that she's a single mother on a very small income trying to make life better for her and her child. It's difficult and I do honestly appreciate that. But her kid's been driving me freaking nuts today. He's in everything, some of it rather dangerous (e.g. using the step-ladder to climb up an office chair and then spin himself madly around till he falls off said chair narrowly missing the edge of the conference table). He cries everytime she tells him not to touch something and the resultant enforced disciplinary quiet-time is quiet for NO ONE.

My head really hurts.