Creative Whinging ©

When JD was about ten, he thought he had whinging down to a fine art. I  challenged him to come up with "creative whinging". 

The basis of this was that I rated his originality and imagination out of ten. If he managed to gain ten points out of ten, then I would surrender to his request. The catch was, the whinging had to be an original and outstanding outburst each time, and of sufficient quality to gain full marks.

And of course, whenever I heard a whiny tone creep into his voice, the points automatically started to drop back, sometimes ending up in the negatives.

The whole concept of creative whinging had him a little bemused. Whining seems to come so naturally to kids that to JD it seemed crazy to think of asking for anything except in a complaining kind of voice. 

For adults, the tone is akin to fingernails down a blackboard, which is probably why many adults give in so easily. Ultimately it becomes a self-perpetuating whinging pattern that's almost impossible to break....It's evil tell you! EVIL! It can go on and on, causing your brain to feel like it's going to explode and the veins in your forehead to pop out...

Ok, Vicki, calm down. Take a deep breath. That's it. Really, it's ok.

Alright, so perhaps it's not really evil. What's really evil is the stinky smell that emanates from their schoolbag! If only the Australian defence forces could bottle it and somehow condense it, they could use it in battle against their enemies. It would really give the Australian forces an unfair advantage in war.

But when it comes to children, I guess at times things can become almost like battlefield condition in the home. Both sides occupied by warring parties who refuse to compromise.

Fortunately as far as I know, no child has ever discovered the almost lethal combination of schoolbag pong and whinging. Parents around the world work hard to keep that knowledge from their children. If kids found out, parents would immediately surrender and chaos would reign in every home throughout the entire world.  ©