Dougal & Kevin

New Parents

Dougal and Kevin have that familiar glazed New Parent look. Their newborn sleeps in a bassinet, and they keep glancing over at it nervously, terrified their child might wake up.

Dougal: Aaron Rubicon, meet Baby Question Mark!

Aaron: I'm sorry... what?

Kevin: That's what we're calling it until it picks a name for itself.

Dougal: I wanted to call it Baby WTF, but apparently, that's nuts.

Kevin: It is! It would be terrible for its self-esteem.

Dougal: As opposed to referring to it as "it"? Which, as everybody knows, is the pronoun of champions. LOL!

Aaron: Well, either way, congratulations you two. Your baby is beautiful.

Kevin: Aw. Thank you!

Dougal: Is it beautiful, Mr. Rubicon? Is it really?

Aaron: Um... yes?

Dougal: Which is its most beautiful feature, do you think? The acne? The crossed eyes? The squished head that looked like it had spent the last nine months stuffed into the nose cone of a rocket?

Kevin: What are you doing?

Dougal: I'm just being honest, Kevin. Babies are gross!

Kevin: They are not!

Dougal: Seriously? Remember what happened the first time I held it? It pooped on my hand! Didn't even ask permission! What kind of person does that?

Kevin: A baby person! And it wasn't poop, it was meconium.

Dougal: Oh, excuse me! It was meconium! Then it's not disgusting at all! Hell, if I knew it was called meconium, I would have spread it on an English muffin and enjoyed it with my morning coffee!

Which, by the way, I need to drink by the gallon! The coffee, not the meconium. LOL! I mean, they tell you how tired you'll get, but — OMG! — it's like getting your back waxed. Until you go through it yourself, you have no idea!

Kevin: Yeah. It's torture. Literally torture! The loud, piercing noise, the sleep deprivation. If you did it to POW's, it would actually violate the Geneva Conventions.

Dougal: [cutesy] You're not just a cone-headed pimple factory, Baby Question Mark. You're a war criminal! Yes you are! Yes you are! LOL!

Aaron: So I guess parenthood has been challenging?

Dougal: Let me put it this way. I now understand why God made sex feel so good.

Aaron: Why?

Dougal: To trick you straights into making what is so obviously the biggest mistake anybody could possibly make!

Kevin: Besides buying one of those Smart Cars, of course.

Dougal: Thanks, Mr. Consumer Reports. Anyway, that's the real reason straight people hated gays. They were jealous! Because we had beaten the system! We found a work-around in the form of a reach-around! LOL!

Kevin: You had to go there.

Dougal: Couldn't stop myself! But I mean, talk about your bait-and-switch! One minute, it's like every cell in my body had just bitten into a York Peppermint Patty at the same time — what? that's what orgasms feel like to me! is that weird? — the next, I'm gaping in horror as Baby Question Mark claws its way out of Kevin's hoo-ha looking like someone had smeared strawberry jam all over Steve Buscemi's face.

Kevin: Steve Buscemi? Seriously?

Dougal: And just to be clear, when I say Steve Buscemi, I am not saying that Baby Question Mark is a boy. Not at all! Although I am saying it was born with a little boner.

Kevin: Yeah. Not thirty seconds after I pushed an entire human being out of my body, Dougal says, "Check it out, Kevin! It has your eyes and my penis!"

Dougal: Kevin didn't find that very funny. It turns out that being in labor is a lot like becoming a vegan: the first thing you lose is your sense of humor. LOL!

[NOTE: The views and opinions expressed by Dougal are his own and do not reflect those of Aaron Rubicon or his geeky affiliate.]

Aaron: Have your parents been helpful?

Kevin: Not as much as you'd think. Disciple Grandma and Disciple Grandpa have been preoccupied.

Dougal: A few days ago, they came running in all freaked out and they're like, "Did you hear what happened, Dougal?" And I'm like, "I can't hear anything! I'm pretty sure Baby Question Mark just ruptured my ear drum!"

Kevin: They said there was some kind of trouble with Robot Jesus.

Dougal: I'm sure the dweebs in tech support weren't ready for that one!

Kevin: "Hi. My messiah crashed. Yes, of course we've tried turning it off and on again! Yes, I'll hold."

Dougal: LOL!

Aaron: Did they say what the problem was?

Kevin: Something called a "kernel panic."

Dougal: Which sounds like what you get when KFC runs out of chicken. LOL!

Kevin: [nothing]

Dougal: Oh, come on! I LOL-ed at your joke!

Kevin: I thought it was a little obvious.

Dougal: Such a critic.

Aaron: Have they made any progress fixing Robot Jesus?

Kevin: They have, but then one of the stoners spilled soda on it.

Dougal: That wasn't helpful. Plus, Fanta Orange? Yuck!

Kevin: Anyway, since then, we've been pretty much on our own.

Baby: [shrieks]

Kevin: Your turn.

[Dougal picks up the baby and tries to sooth it; it keeps shrieking and shrieking and Oh, Lord, it just won't shut up!]

Dougal: [shouting over the screaming] REMIND ME WHY WE WANTED TO HAVE A CHILD AGAIN?

Kevin: [shouting over the screaming] YOUR PARENTS THOUGHT WE SHOULD HELP REPOPULATE THE SPECIES!

Dougal: OH, SHIT, YOU'RE RIGHT! I TOTALLY FORGOT! WHEN, OH WHEN, AM I GOING TO LEARN THAT NOTHING GOOD EVER COMES FROM LISTENING TO MY PARENTS!

Kevin: IT SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME!

Dougal: SO DID DUBSTEP, BUT IT FUCKING WASN'T! AND THIS — AS HARD AS IT IS TO BELIEVE — IS EVEN MORE ANNOYING!

Kevin: WELL, AT LEAST WE'RE REPOPULATING THE SPECIES!

Dougal: YEAH, BUT HAVING SPENT SOME QUALITY TIME WITH HIM, IS THAT REALLY SUCH A GREAT IDEA?

Kevin: DID YOU JUST CALL IT A HE?

Dougal: GIVE IT A REST, KEVIN! HE, SHE, IT, THEM, WHATEVER! THE SPECIES IS AWFUL!

Kevin: NO! THAT'S JUST HOW BABIES ARE!

Dougal: NOT JUST BABIES! ALL OF US! WE'RE UGLY AND LOUD AND SELFISH AND ALL WE WANT TO DO IS EAT AND SHIT! THINK ABOUT IT! WHAT THE HELL IS SO GREAT ABOUT US?

Baby: [silence]

Dougal: Oh, thank you, Carbon-Based Jesus! Thank you!

Kevin: Wow. That was a rough one. Are you OK?

Dougal: Yeah. Sorry for all that.

Kevin: It's all right. This is really hard.

Dougal: But I've got to be honest, I don't know how much more of this I can... [gasps] Did you see that? Did you see that?!

Kevin: See what?

Dougal: Baby Question Mark just smiled at me!

Kevin: Well, actually—

Dougal: Its first smile! Isn't that the most precious thing you've ever seen? [to baby] I take back everything I said about you! [cutesy voice] You're not a war criminal! No you're not! No, you're not!

Kevin: That's technically not a smile.

Dougal: What are you talking about? Yes it is!

Kevin: The baby is too young to smile.

Dougal: Really?

Kevin: It's probably just passing gas.

Dougal: Passing gas?

Kevin: Yeah. Sorry.

Dougal: Oh. Well, you know what? I don't care! I'm still counting it! LOL!