Housewide Prohibition
Dear James,
I'm 21 years old now and living with my parents while I go to school. My parents can be real control freaks sometimes, and they won't let me keep alcohol around the house, or even drink it at all while I'm at home. I hate being treated like some errant teenager, but I can't afford to both move out and go to school at the same time. What can I do?
Controlled in California
Dear Controlled,
Drinking at your parent's house needn't be that different than drinking in public places. Sure, you might need to be a bit more discreet than putting your vodka bottles in brown paper sacks, but the theory is the same. Using empty soda bottles is a good place to start for hiding the booze's physical presence, but the scent of inebriation is hard to mistake, which means if you ever plan to indulge yourself in actual drinking you might be required to make certain lifestyle changes.
Obviously the lifestyle change you won't be making is respecting your parent's wishes and acquiesce to their rules. We all understand this to mean your parent's have "won", and no American child worthy of calling themselves such wants that. Mind games and skulduggery are really your only options, preserving a longstanding tradition for children of privilege to avoid situations that inconvenience them. One old stand-by solution that's been in use for decades is to claim or arrange the desired activities to be "for school." Amongst parents homework is a sacred institution which, once assigned, may not be questioned or inhibited in any way. This doctrine stems from when children went to school with the intent of gaining training that would make them more industrious, and thus more successful. They would then use some of that success to ensure that their parents were well taken care of after retirement. While every part of this view is now obsolete, it will take a few decades for the culture to catch up with the economy. With this in mind check to see if your university offers a major in Fermentation Sciences that you can add to your existing one. If not, check out the community colleges in the surrounding area. You may be able to transfer (admittedly useless) credits from one to the other. The rest of the plan flows logically from here: making alcohol is part of your education, testing that alcohol is part of your grade, and maintaining your grade requires homework. All homework is protected by the sacred parenting doctrine which trumps personal distaste or fear of carpet stains (usually, don't go too wild with the carpet stains. Some subcultures within the parent community leave an out for protecting carpets).
If, for whatever reason your parents are having trouble following why you now have free license to booze up in their house, try discussing the earning potential of breweries in comparison to your current major in underwater basket-weaving sciences. Jointly, start frequent discussions on the state of Social Security in 20 years and problems with their 401k plan. The fear and uncertainty should overtake reason soon enough, putting you well on your way to being able to play your video games completely schnookered once again.
Best of luck,
James
I'm 21 years old now and living with my parents while I go to school. My parents can be real control freaks sometimes, and they won't let me keep alcohol around the house, or even drink it at all while I'm at home. I hate being treated like some errant teenager, but I can't afford to both move out and go to school at the same time. What can I do?
Controlled in California
Dear Controlled,
Drinking at your parent's house needn't be that different than drinking in public places. Sure, you might need to be a bit more discreet than putting your vodka bottles in brown paper sacks, but the theory is the same. Using empty soda bottles is a good place to start for hiding the booze's physical presence, but the scent of inebriation is hard to mistake, which means if you ever plan to indulge yourself in actual drinking you might be required to make certain lifestyle changes.
Obviously the lifestyle change you won't be making is respecting your parent's wishes and acquiesce to their rules. We all understand this to mean your parent's have "won", and no American child worthy of calling themselves such wants that. Mind games and skulduggery are really your only options, preserving a longstanding tradition for children of privilege to avoid situations that inconvenience them. One old stand-by solution that's been in use for decades is to claim or arrange the desired activities to be "for school." Amongst parents homework is a sacred institution which, once assigned, may not be questioned or inhibited in any way. This doctrine stems from when children went to school with the intent of gaining training that would make them more industrious, and thus more successful. They would then use some of that success to ensure that their parents were well taken care of after retirement. While every part of this view is now obsolete, it will take a few decades for the culture to catch up with the economy. With this in mind check to see if your university offers a major in Fermentation Sciences that you can add to your existing one. If not, check out the community colleges in the surrounding area. You may be able to transfer (admittedly useless) credits from one to the other. The rest of the plan flows logically from here: making alcohol is part of your education, testing that alcohol is part of your grade, and maintaining your grade requires homework. All homework is protected by the sacred parenting doctrine which trumps personal distaste or fear of carpet stains (usually, don't go too wild with the carpet stains. Some subcultures within the parent community leave an out for protecting carpets).
If, for whatever reason your parents are having trouble following why you now have free license to booze up in their house, try discussing the earning potential of breweries in comparison to your current major in underwater basket-weaving sciences. Jointly, start frequent discussions on the state of Social Security in 20 years and problems with their 401k plan. The fear and uncertainty should overtake reason soon enough, putting you well on your way to being able to play your video games completely schnookered once again.
Best of luck,
James
posted by James at 4:38 PM
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