Birthday party at a tae kwon do place. IMO, martial arts for children does not deliver on its promises of physical restraint and self-control. Instead, youngsters who train seem more aggressive than those who don't.

The other parents thought my Kenny a "natural" on defensive moves. I attributed his mastery of blocking motions to "rough play" with his younger brothers.

Ten minutes were spent on "stranger danger" tips and techniques. I was uncomfortable with the hypothetical scenarios and the play-acting attacks.

One little girl who appeared to be about three years old did not want to participate. She did not want to act the part of "the bad guy", placing her hands around another child's throat, neither did she want to be "the victim", laying on the floor with another's hands on her throat. The instructor and his assistant forced her to participate, through her tears, all the while telling her, "This is fun. This is fun." If she had been my daughter ...

One of the hypothetical scenarios involved a grandmother-y type lady asking the child to help her find her lost kitty. The children were instructed to not help her, to not talk to her, to yell and scream and run away to mom and dad. Yes, to act so deranged that no one would want to abduct them ... they'd be too much trouble to keep. And I thought to myself, how long ago was it that boy scouts were helping these seniors across the street?! What types of children are we producing? Unhelpful and disrespectful. A couple of instances when I helped someone here.

The other scenario was a male stranger attempting to pick the child up from school with some cock-eyed story of taking the child to see injured parents in the hospital. Now, I don't know how most schools work, but my children are not waiting on the curb for me to drive by and pick them up. They wait inside the building and I either go in and get them or a teacher calls them out to me. I have never put the school to the test, but I doubt very much that they would release my child to any unauthorized person.

I realize that the gym is located in Jackson. I have gone over before how we reside between Hamilton and Jackson, gruesome endpoints for anyone who knows anything about recent cases of violence against children. But the Jackson case does not fit the "stranger danger" scenario, not really. The poor kid was going door-to-door and the predator was another child. Of course, the Hamilton case is classic, hence the law on it. I'm actually more concerned about my children visiting homes of handgun-owners or being injured in a car crash.

It's important education. I'm sure they get drilled on it in school. It had no place at a birthday party and frankly, it wasn't conducted very well. Alright, 'nuff said.

They played a version of "Simon Says." None of them were any good at it. I asked Kenny afterwards, "Do you ever play 'Simon Says' at school?" He said no. That was very, very obvious because none of the kids could do it.

They played a variation of "Four Corners" and I detected Kenny's strategy immediately: he would run to the corner that had been picked most recently! Consistently, every time. Sometimes others would follow him but not always. He ended up winning the game!

I asked him whether he plays that game at school and he said yes. I asked him to explain his strategy and he told me that the one who is "It" is not likely to pick the same corner twice in a row, so he always goes to the corner picked last! But, when he's "It" at school, HE does sometimes pick the same corner twice in a row and once got out Amy and Catherine and Denise and Sabrina all at the same time! I think that he enjoyed getting out the girls ... girls who were trying to imitate his strategy.