Other people's kids are scary

The other night, my husband and I went to Starbucks to unwind with a cup of coffee. He got plain 'ol coffee, even though I warned him it tastes like charcoal. We joke that I like my coffee strong enough to take the paint off a Grand Am and he likes vesh (literally, Russian for "thing" or "stuff"; his grandpa used to complain in Russian about that the weak coffee my in-laws made, and the only word my husband remembered from that tirade was vesh. I'm guessing it was in the context of, "What is this stuff?!"). Anyway....

We were the only people in Starbucks, aside from the baristas, and we took our seats at a table in the back. We enjoyed our coffee and conversation for a good hour (we're slow) and then..... kids showed up. Two little boys carrying personal-sized pizza boxes from the Target Cafe walked back to the area where we were sitting and set their goods on the "bar" that butts up against the windows. One little boy sat on the "bar stool". The other boy turned and said, "We need some peace and quiet back here!" and proceeded to bring down the blinds on all of the windows. Meanwhile, the parents and two more kids meandered back to the area where we were sitting. The dad and the youngest child, probably about 2-3, sat at the next table over from us. The kid's coat fell off the back of the chair; no one bothered to pick it up. Keep in mind, this is Minnesota in winter and the floors are constantly wet from the snow people track in. The child commenced devouring breadsticks; when the family finally left, there was a veritable mountain of crumbs on the table. I'll bet you could have made another breadstick out of that. My husband and I wondered (sotto voce, of course, so as not to piss off the parents) if you have to try to be that piggy -- I mean, no one is naturally that much of a slob, are they? My husband asked me, "Why do people leave messes like that in public? Do you think they do that at home, too?" I told him it was because they know someone will always clean up after them, so they don't have to be responsible for the schmutz they leave behind. Sure enough, just as I was saying that, one of the baristas appeared with a rag and bottle of disinfectant spray to wipe down the tables and such.

Where was I going with this...? Oh yeah. Apparently, I'm pretty good with kids. Granted, I did have a naked 6-year old jump on my back while I was in the locker room at the YMCA once (her mom said the girl was "excitable"), but... The problem is, I don't like kids. At all. Looking at pictures of other people's babies and whatnot inspires nothing in me. My ovaries crawl up inside my thorax at the mere thought of having children (same thing happens to my husband, except with the corresponding gonads). The thought of nuturing what is essentially a parasite for 9 months, squeezing it out through an opening that really seems ill-designed for this purpose, and then having the thing expell various fluids on me doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun. Finding out recently that the hormone relaxin, which causes ligaments like the pubic symphysis to soften, will cause my already enormous Italian hips to get even bigger and my already defective lower back to hurt even more -- gosh, that sounds like a real treat! Where do I sign up?