Patience, something we only have in abundance when watching five-day cricket, is a necessary evil. If one small burp makes you think, "That'll do", you'll soon find the baby awake and screaming, putting you back to sub-square one.
Going backwards like that is abhorrent to all man. We like to go forward, at speed and with as little effort as possible. That's why we invented the car, and my particular favourite, the escalator.
It's tempting to put your baby down as soon as it drops off and run to the pub, or at least the fridge. Wrong. If you don’t put in the full 15-20 minutes of arm-numbing walking around while they doze on your shoulder, they won't reach the deep level of sleep that you can only dream about. Or would if you got some sleep.
For my New Year's Resolution I'm going to try not to bore people about tiredness. Those with kids nod knowingly and slightly annoyingly and those without really don't give a shit.
Yes, it's tiring, but so is going to the pub every night. And no one thanks you for that.
It's perfectly acceptable for new parents to tell anyone who'll listen, "God I'm tired. Little Tarquinella restricted me to 1 hour 27 minutes sleep last night." Yet sympathy is thin on the ground when you say: "God I'm tired. I drank an alphabet of ales and my little deep fried kebab restricted me to 1 hour 27 minutes sleep, in a gutter, lying in my own poo." So unfair.
It's been suggested that it's a shame we had Kit so late in the year, with the wintry weather restricting our trips outside. But they didn't consider the timing of The Ashes.
With the cricket kicking off at 2am in the UK, I tend to jump out of bed for the night feed with a chirpy, "Leave him to me. You rest, my love. You deserve it," making me appear selfless and heroic for at least 25 days of the winter.
God, I'm tired, though.
