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We went to mini golf last night. It was pretty late, I would think, even for a Saturday night. We got there at 9:30. The place was packed and there was a family in front of us with four kids between the ages of about 6 and 11. I thought, oh man, we're going to be here FOREVER with these kids in front of us. But actually, by the time we were ready for the next hole, they were just finishing it. And all the kids were pretty nice and polite.

But, we didn't finish until 11, and they still had plans to go out for ice cream.

My husband said to me, "shouldn't those kids be in bed or something?"

Ugh...my latest pet peeve: KIDS IN THE LIBRARY!!! I'm not saying kids shouldn't go to the library...I'm saying they should behave properly in the library. I usually go to the library once a week. It seems like the behavior of kids (and some adults!) is getting worse and worse. Libraries are supposed to be QUIET places. A place where you can browse, sit down in one of the comfy chairs, and READ. There are students there studying as well.

Yet people bring kids in there who are crying, fussing, screaming, running, talking loudly, etc. Why aren't these parents teaching their kids that this isn't a place for that?

A couple of week ago, I was there and a mother brought a kid in who was already BAWLING her eyes out. It's not like it happened when they were already there. No, she brought the already screaming/bawling kid into the library. Fun. Many of the patrons were disgusted. When I was checking out (and the kid was still throwing a temper tantrum), on of the patrons made a remark about it to the librarian. The librarian said that it annoys the staff as well, but they aren't allowed to say anything about it!

Then again, how are kids supposed to learn. Especially when the "mother" (I use that term loosely) was yammering away on her cell phone, paying no mind to her kid or the other patrons.

YES! Why are they running in the library? That's what bothers me more than the talking!

I agree 100% with the points about the noisy kids and cell phones in the library. At the library I go to, the rule about cell phones is you can only use them in the lobby area near the entrance. Yesterday I ordered some bike parts on the internet. I used a computer at the libarary because my home PC is a dinosaur. (dog slow dialup) I went out to the lobby to call the tech support service at BikeNashbar to make sure I ordered the right parts. Another fellow told me when I finished my call "it sucks that you can only use your cell phone in the lobby." Whatever. Most of the time, I leave my cell phone at home when I go to the library.
Mike

As I've mentioned before, I work in a bookstore. There aren't a lot of differences in child and parent behavior there compared with your library stories. Except that your description is a watered-down version of what I see at work. In other words, I've seen it much worse.

They don't just run, they run until they literally run into someone. Often, that's me. Usually when I'm toting a heavy dolly full of boxes of magazines...

The babies scream until even the staff is giving the parent dirty looks. No one is comforting the child, or removing the child from the store until it is calm. Do they care at all about their baby or the people around them?

Our Kids section is the sight of daily disasters. Dozens of books piled on the floor on a daily basis. Frequently, there will be "forts" for the beanie babies built of books and section dividers on the floor in the corner.

The Kids room is a nightmare. The parents don't parent in there. They bring piles of books from other sections, sit down to read, and let they're kids run wild. Then both parent and child leave the books piled all over the floor, chairs, etc... even if mommy's chosen reading material is about cannabis or sex.

Just what every bookstore needs: A Kids room full of sex books and trip hazards! They not only care little for their own children, they don't give a damn about anyone else's.

Sorry, I've gone off on a tangent. But I really wish I could make my store a CF zone...

One of the casinos we go to at AC now has a pool for only Over- 21.
The AC casino pools are packed w/kids. I don't even know why the parents take them to AC, but of course they congregate at the pools. We always thought that on a AC trip we wouldn't see any of them.......

And that's one of MY pet peeves as well - that kids take over the damn pools. I was on a ski weekend last year and the other half and I went to use the communal hot tub at the hotel we were staying at. There was a dad and three kids there, and the kids were running between the heated swimming pool and the hot tub (where Dad was), squealing, splashing and running while he just sat there. I finally got really [censored] when the two girls started having a splash fight in the hot tub, told both of them to knock it off and then gave Dad the death glare. Thank god he took the hint, packed up and took them over to the main pool soon after that. Dude, I came down here to relax and chill out, not listen to your kids screeching - and why do I have to teach them how to behave? Isn't that YOUR job?

Of course, the other half thought I was totally overreacting. Sometimes I could really have slapped him ...

I think with this, the mother has learned to tune her child out. And that's how they probably deal with it at home, when they get to the end of their rope. They try to tune the kid out. What they *don't* realize is that their children aren't everyone else's problem. And that they should act like adults, and remove their child for the sake of others. But they are selfish, and don't want to do that. So they make others suffer.

To what Jez said, the "cell phone Mom" really bugs me. My sister is like that - whatever is going on with her friends is infinitely more interesting than what her son is doing. She is literally always on the phone when she is with her son (which isn't that often) so that even when she is present, she really isn't there with him. So sad.

I see this a lot with young Moms. They are still trying to act like teenagers and live the party life, and talk on the phone all day long. But they do it at the expense of their children. Drives me nuts!

I hate people on cell phones. It seems I'm always standing in line behind them at the grocery store. A couple times I've taken a call in a store, but I always say "hold on" or "I'll call you back" and put it down when I'm standing in line. There was a mom with her kid in line the other day. The mom was on her cell phone. Little Suzy was trying to talk to her, and the guy behind the counter was trying to talk to her, and she was trying to talk on the phone. She kept apologizing to the person on the phone "I'm sorry, I'm trying to check out at the grocery store."

Little Suzy had chocolate smeared all over her face, so the kid at the counter gave Mom a paper towel. She absently scraped at her kid's face while he packed up her cart - she wasn't paying attention because she was on her super important phone call! Half the time she wasn't even getting the chocolate off, and Little Suzy didn't appreciate her face getting scraped, so she started putting up a fuss.

Thank god they left then.

Kids at the pool bug me, too, but I realize they want to have fun, and they should be allowed to, as long as it's contained/controlled. But the hot tub story -- that's overboard, and I don't blame you at all, Pikasam.