Five Apps You'll Be a Horrible Parent Without

You’re a smart parent. You have a smartphone. You’re familiar with apps that create loud, bright emergency diversions like YouTube, Hulu and Netflix. But here are some Android apps that will kick up your parenting game seven or eight whole notches.

*Image cropped to remove several square inches of empty space

1. Fortune Clock

by Swiven. $0.

This is a handy alarm clock app that — and this is a huge game-changer — also incorporates fortune-telling. You meditate on a problem that’s been bothering you, then you tap one of eight symbols “by intuition.” A wild fortune appears!

“When you prepare something already, marches forward courageously, it’s real good symbol for you!” Fortune Clock says. “Due to this factor, you will sacrifice time of with your family, even away from your lover…”

It’s super effective! And this is obviously much more sophisticated than somebody’s first attempt at coding an Android app. Each fortune feels uniquely crafted and comes with at least 7 sets of contradictory advice.

2. Dancing Toilet Fun Dance Game

by Mibejo Mobile. $0.

This app’s strongest point? It does what it says in the title. A poorly drawn cartoon toilet with big angry eyes dances to synthesized music when you press the “dance” button. A poop appears, complete with fart noise, when you press the poop button. When you press the “F” button, you hear a flush and the poop shrinks until it disappears, because that’s exactly how toilets work. When you press the back button on your device, a giant ad swivels to cover the entire screen. If Dancing Toilet Fun Dance Game isn’t your thing, you can check out another app from the developer, Dancing Poo Virtual Pet Dance.

3. Alien Scanner UFO Radar

by Circle Star Software. $0.

Possibly the most complete UFO Radar app I’ve installed. It has a sweeping purple arm, some moving yellow triangles and even a moving red dot! There’s a transceiver tuned into the intergalactic frequency for scary text messages, and words like “humans” “earthlings” “mothership” and “surrender” scroll by in an intricate pattern that seems random until you stare at them for seven minutes straight and the paranoia kicks in.

Marcanthony Garcia gave Alien Scanner UFO Radar three stars, saying: “its fake why do the yellow triangles hoover and red dot fly plus all it said on the tanseiver was attack surrender human contact earth and earthlings but i gave it a good review because it did scare me at first lol”

To sum up, Alien Scanner UFO Radar is an indispensable app for anyone who wants to detect free audiobooks and can’t remember audible.com’s URL.

4. Fingertip Violin Playing

Canada HadAPP Team. $0.

This app opens to the minimalistic interface of a tiny violin on a white background. When you touch the screen, a tiny bow appears beneath your finger. Then violin music starts playing, even though your finger isn’t moving. After wiggling your finger around for a couple of seconds, you realize the movement of your bow has nothing to do with the music. You are a deaf violinist, and no matter what horrible screeching sounds you could potentially be making, in your own mind it all sounds like a beautifully performed and horribly compressed classical recording. A “More” button will just play the recordings for you without all the tedious bow waggling. The “Supply” button opens a window, which reads:

“How to support this app?

Give me 5 Stars;

Share with friends;Tell me problems;

(button) Give 5 Stars (button) Later”

This app, while not really a workable replacement for the “world’s tiniest violin” gag where you rub your fingers together and make violin sounds with your mouth to accompany a friend’s melodrama, is a nice reminder that there’s someone out there to whom you can tell your problems.

5. Scales Simulator

by Piupiu. $0.

Like some of the other apps on this list, Scales Simulator really earns points for simplicity. When you put your finger on the picture of the scale, it displays a completely random number — down to the thousandths! Of course, to get to the picture of the scale, you have to get past the loading screen, then press the start button partially obscured by an ad, then close out of the full-screen ad that pops up. But don’t worry! There’s a big blue arrow that takes you back to the screen with the start button, in case you missed the ad there. The app has one shortcoming, as Elvin Babayev points out: “Works if only put your finger. Very very bad.” Indeed, if you try to place other objects on the picture of the scale — such as the tiny mound of white powder featured on the app’s cover — it fails to generate a random number. I can imagine several situations involving tiny mounds of white powder and impulsive decisions that could end up “very very bad” if you were to rely on Scales Simulator. That’s why it’s important to read the app description: “Make fun with friends with scales simulation.” And that’s where this app really shines.

So remember! You can't be a good parent without these apps. Your parents didn't have these apps, and they were horrible, remember? Don't let some therapist pin all your kids' hangups on you! Get these apps!

I’d promise a sequel of iOS Apps You Can’t Parent Without, but I don’t have any Apple devices. And it seems like they might have some sort of app vetting process.

Teething is a... well, you know.

Product Review: Baby teeth (1.5/5)

Do you have teeth? Me too. Remember when they grew in? Me neither, and thank the luckiest of stars above, because it is rough. Teething gets 1.5 stars. Or less.

So I have a beautiful daughter. She's smiley, happy and the light of my life. That's all fine and good, but when I ordered this child I did NOT order a lengthy and untimely ordeal like teething. Her first two teeth came screaming in around 3 1/2 or four months. Stressful. I have read in a very reliable baby book of baby-rearing knowledge that teething does not, in fact, cause any of the following: night waking, fever, extra night feedings, etc. This is an obese lie, the largest lie you can even imagine. She woke up a ton more at night and had a fever and needed more food. I'm sorry Dr. Smarts, you aren't a mother, and you don't have your own baby with teeth coming in.

Lovable and drooly bulldog.

Anyway, we had already been through this teething business once and it blessed us again around seven months. By blessed, I mostly mean scammed. She was for sure teething for about three weeks. I could see the little white buds on her top gums and she was drooling like a bulldog (a precious, lovable bulldog). Then, Houdini-like, the symptoms and the little buds disappear. They just left me wondering if I was a mother making up symptoms to explain an inability to soothe my own baby. I swear, they really were coming in!

Then, in December, she had some back-to-back colds. A nice little Christmas gift for us. At the tail end of the last one, she managed to sneak some teething in for a New Year's surprise. Not one, not two, but three pearly whites just magically appeared with no more fanfare than a bit of extra drooling (think three bull dogs), extra sleeping and a slightly more cranky Charlotte.

She is now trying to break these three new teeth all the way out of gum-jail. I'm really surprised by the quiet nature of this third teething round. It's not so bad as the first or second time (and the second time really did happen; I'm not crazy) and I am also a fan of cutting multiple teeth at a time. I'll take a week from the pits of Tartarus if it means all the teeth coming at once.

So, if you're thinking of ordering a round of baby teething, here's a review for you to ponder:
Delivery: A bit early, then a no-show, but then just right.
Satisfaction: Well, it increases the ability to chew food and smile less like a toothless grandpa, but it does increase nose-biting ability. That's from experience, people. Terrible experience.
Cost: Doesn't cost much, just a few extra pounds perhaps as you stress-eat your way through bags of chocolate or gallons of ice-cream.
Overall: 1.5 stars. It's worth it in the end, but boy-oh-boy, it's a rough ride.

I'm lucky I still have all my digits.