Adam Carolla - Daddy, Stop Talking! - And Other Things My Kids Want but Won't Be Getting

My kids, and all modern kids, are spoiled when it comes to the movies. They will never know the pathetic majesty that was the drive-in. These went the way of the dodo when I was in my twenties. The harbinger of doom for these American institutions was when they started having swap meets on the grounds during the daylight hours. Frankly, I’m surprised they hung on as long as they did. It’s a crazy business model. You need acres and acres of real estate, tons of concrete, lots of equipment — all for a business that can only operate after sundown. But there was something beautiful about a night at the drive-in. It was always a thrill going from the car to the snack shack, weaving through the cars in the dark, waving at friends. When you’re in a movie theater now, going from your seat to the snack bar is a pain in the ass, stepping into someone’s spilled soda and pretty much giving the person in the seat next to you a lap dance as you attempt to exit the row. You get in that argument with your wife, “Come on. You go get the Goobers, I got them last time.” “Why do I have to do everything?” Yet the drive-in snack shack was about four miles away, but you had no complaints at all about making that trip. Maybe because there was stuff to see, especially people making out in the back of cars.

I think if we’re realistic, we can just admit the whole business model was based on backseat boning. Did people not have places to have sex in the ’60s and ’70s? I guess kids still had the decorum to lie to their parents back then and pretend they weren’t having sex. Teenagers had to steal away to the drive-in to finger-blast their best gal while Rebel Without a Cause played a hundred yards away, especially if they didn’t have a basement. I’m sure when Sonny is sixteen he’s just gonna be like, “Hey, Dad, could you clear out? Here’s a five. Go down to the liquor store, get yourself a six-pack of Mickey’s and drink it in the parking lot. I’ll be nailing my girlfriend on your bed.”

When I was growing up, our family went to the drive-in once or twice but it was typically a disaster. We were always caught off guard, “Who’s got a blanket? The car’s parked sideways, Dad. We can’t see.” But I distinctly remember seeing the cagey veterans of the drive-in, the folks super-committed to this family night out. They had folding chairs, hammocks, quilts and their own popcorn machine. It was like the parking lot at a Jimmy Buffett concert.

Nowadays, taking the kids to a film is a festival of annoyance. I’ll start with the aforementioned snack bar.

I’m not one of those guys who complain about the price of movies. Having made two of them, I know how much effort they are to produce and I think the idea of sinking thirteen bucks into something an army of people put a hundred million into isn’t that tall an order. But the price of the snacks is a different story. That I can complain about. I’d be fine with the inflated cost of theater popcorn if it were satisfying. But I resent paying thirteen-fifty for a small popcorn. That dollar to calorie ratio is horrible. Weight wise, it’s more expensive than cocaine.

More importantly, you never know what you’re going to get. Movie popcorn has too much range. It goes from so super salty I can’t eat it, to so right that I can’t stop myself, to so dry that I’m going to bring it home and use it as blown insulation.

Plus, I don’t like when you pay as much for the popcorn as the movie ticket and the girl at the snack counter already has it set aside. I want a fresh scoop of popcorn from the bottom where it’s still warm, salty and soaking in coagulated butter. I want to see you digging for gold, baby.

By the way, do yourself a favor and skip the fake butter. Here’s how you know the shit is cancerous and horrible for you — it’s self-serve. You can top yourself off. If it was real, actual food it would be expensive and they’d dispense it themselves. Plus, anything self-serve is a very ugly American thing. Imagine telling someone in the Third World that all of us have access to unlimited fake butter, as much as we can consume. We could sit under that tap and just squirt it forever like a golden butter bukakke and no one could stop us.

And that fake greasy butter really ruins the movie experience if you’re seeing something in 3-D. Every other movie that comes out now is in 3-D, so those silly goggles are ubiquitous. When the kids put them on they smear them with greasy popcorn fingers, so what they’re seeing looks like the White Diamonds commercial circa 1987. Everything is in soft focus, like a Barbara Walters interview.

Here’s my solution to this smudgy 3-D glasses problem, and it actually involves a solution. Since that artificial butter is completely chemical anyway, why not throw a little glass cleaner in there? That way while your kids are smearing their fingers on the glasses they’re actually cleaning them. We’ll call it “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Windex.”

And my kids have no idea what a feast the movies are for them. When Lynette takes the kids to the movies they hit the snack counter and walk into the theater with a popcorn, a kosher hot dog, a twenty-ounce soda and an order of curly fries — each. They eat a meal, not a snack. The idea of going to the movies when I was a kid and even slowing down at the snack counter was unimaginable. The Carolla plan was to stop at the liquor store, grab a Three Musketeers and keister it. You had to sneak the snacks.

And with kids and the cost of movies it’s not just the tickets and snacks, it’s the merchandise. If I go to see a movie with Lynette it costs me fifty dollars by the time we’re done with parking, popcorn and drinks. When I take the kids to the movies, not only does it break into triple digits for that night out, the spending doesn’t stop even after the credits have. When Frozen came out, my bank account got frostbite. I had to buy the soundtrack, ten different Barbie versions of Elsa, a Lego version and thirteen princess outfits for Natalia to dress up in. There was this one-upmanship happening with her friends. Natalia only had the doll and the outfit with the crown, meanwhile her friend Cami had the scale replica of the village and the kid-sized sleigh. So I was considered a worse father than Papa John Phillips because my credit card, and thus Natalia, couldn’t keep up. Disney does to my wallet what the Indians do to the buffalo. No part gets wasted. When they’re done, there’s nothing left.

All I’m saying is this. You parents reading this know raising kids in today’s society is hard enough as is without Hollywood and Silicon Valley making it worse. So please, take a stand with me and limit your kids downloading and streaming to my podcasts and independent films only. Thank you.

I’VE LONG SAIDthat kids today are lazy, fat, self-entitled pussies. And you know what? It is our fault. This chapter is a much-needed smack in the face to all of us, my fellow parents. By softening them up as much as we have, we’re setting our kids and our culture up for failure. If we were Japanese, they’d all kill themselves and if we were in a war, we’d all be dead.

Here’s how off the rails we’ve gone in rearing our kids. I noticed one day Sonny was playing with a toy bubble gun. It was like a squirt gun that you load up with the soapy solution and when you pull the trigger, it blows bubbles. Is this how lazy we’ve gotten? What happened to those little plastic sticks with the hole that you would blow into to make bubbles? Are our kids so pampered that asking them to exhale into a miniature hoop is too tall an order?