How To Be The World's Meanest Mom

My children have often declared me the meanest mom in the world. I do not understand this. Do they think this hurts my feelings? If they only knew how my heart swells when I hear it, they would never utter the phrase again. Indeed, it is completely reinforcing my Mean Mom Behavior when they say it. I figure I must be doing something right. Also? I come from a proud lineage of Mean Moms. And my mother says I've got nothing on her own mother. My mom says that my sweet Granny was the world's meanest mother. I think she is lying. I cannot reconcile the words Mean Mom with my Granny. But she insists it is true.

Over the weekend I was declared once and for all the World's Meanest Mom. Would you like to know how I achieved this status? The no fuss, no muss steps go something like this:

1. Declare the house a complete and utter mess.
2. Give your children the stink eye when they look around in bewilderment and ask what's wrong with it.
3. Pronounce each room worse than the one before it and insist that we are living in the Pit of Despair.
4. Tell them the maid quit.
5. Remind them that we NEVER HAD A MAID TO BEGIN WITH!
6. Charge each one with disorderly living and conduct unbecoming a human. Tell them that there are pigsties cleaner than their living areas.
7. Inform them that from now on, a fee will be levied for each shoe, article of clothing, or toy that you pick up from the floor.
8. Caution them that you will be keeping said items until the fine is paid.
9. Turn your back on their whining.
10. Smile as they bemoan how unfair you are being.
11. Let them know that if they would like a refund of their fine, they must do a chore of your choosing.
12. Laugh as they knit their brows together as they inform you that none of their friends' mothers would even THINK of committing such abuse to their children.
13. Keep a dry erase board in the children's' bathroom reminding them to pick up their clothing or they will pay.
14. Sign it "Love, Mom."
15. Tell them you will be doing random sweeps. Sometimes you will announce them, sometimes you will not.
16. Smile as you tell them you had several courses on behavioral psychology in college. Then pat them on the heads and call them your lab monkeys.
17. Listen to them mutter to themselves and each other about how you are the MEANEST MOM THAT EVER LIVED!
18. Walk away satisfied that you are living up to your heritage.

Yes, I know, I know. It seems so easy! Almost too good to be true, right? But if you are looking to claim your own title, this is a certain way to get it.

Tell me. Are you a Mean Mom? What do you do that make your children think that you are the Meanest. Mom. Ever! Was your mother a Mean Mom? (Mine was and I thank God for her daily!) Do you think that your children will appreciate your meanness at some point in the future, or do you, like me, hedge your bets with a healthy donation to your children's therapy jars?