Born to Be Awkward: Celebrating Those Imperfect Moments of Babyhood by Mike Bender, Doug Chernack
My rating: 3/5 cats
meh. i think i dropped the “reviewing this on time” ball here* because this book just wasn’t all that entertaining to me. if the premise is meant to be “kids are weird-looking” or “kids are gross,” i mean, you’re preaching to the choir with that message.
that’s basically the takeaway from this book, and unless you really like looking at pictures of kids making weird faces or doing gross things, you could probably do something better with your time.
i’ll help out and i’ll give you the highlight reel:
kids are weird-looking:
this kid looks like gollum
and the photo doesn’t improve when you pan back. yeesh.
this is an old lady pretending to be a baby
this kid is an oompa loompa
this kid is trying to revive his marriage with sexxy boudoir photography and it isn’t going well
this kid needs to befriend a milliner
these kids are drunkards. and might actually be the same kid. it’s uncanny.
kids are gross:
i’m not sure which one is grosser here—the face rash or the one who thinks face rashes are yummy
this is a very late stage prom baby
actually, i like this one. this is gonna look nice on the fridge
i don’t even want to conjecture about the circumstances surrounding the snapping of this photo because they all end in jail time
i’m impressed here that pee has such a well-defined shadow
some kids are gross and weird-looking:
or are greg’s mom
ADDITIONAL FACTS
some kids are freaking terrifying:
do not fuck with tamara.
do. not.
and some are very sad
to be fair, this it probably really intense if you’re on acid
and if those are in fact used condoms hanging off those hats, i can see this being demoralizing as well.
but this is just straight-up ungrateful. lean into the love, kiddo!
i always used to wonder why anyone would opt for this style when school picture time rolled around. and now i know why—for precious memories like these.
so for anyone wondering why i don’t have kids and why i don’t want kids, the above examples should be adequate. but also, i think i would just be terrible at it. i’d be the one dropping the kid
or leaving the kid crumpled at the foot of the stairs
or pushing the kid off the wall
or treating the kids like they’re jarts
or forgetting the kid in the middle of the graveyard
but if this book were a baby catalogue and i was forced to buy one baby from it to take home with me and raise (poorly) on my own, i guess i would take this one:
because this is at least a kid whose goals i understand.
and this one looks so much like a friend of mine i had to read the contributor’s info in the back to make sure. but no, it’s not him. except that i still think it IS and he’s just changed his name because of witness protection or something.
in conclusion—kids. weird. gross. etc.
* which does not hold true for all the books i have pending reviews on, just this one some of them.
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