Child care and work ...

So L'il Rhody is nearly three months old and Mrs. Rhody is back at work. We don't have day care (wife works 8 a.m.-8 p.m.), but I've manged to work my schedule so we don't have to rely on family to watch her.
Friday she works and I'm at home with the little one, which would be fine except I have football at 7 p.m. My plan is to bundle the kid up and bring her along. The team I'm covering is one of the worst in the state and they're playing the best in the state, so I'm not super concerned about missing much. I'm pretty much just going to get stats.
Is this a 100 percent awful idea? Has anyone tried something like this?
My biggest concern is the weather; if it gets too cold or rains or something. I don't want to bring her in the pressbox, especially if she's fussy. I'm not going anywhere near the sidelines because I'm not stupid. I think this will work ... but not 100 percent sure.

 

If it works exactly as you have it planned -- no weather problems, no any other logistical problems -- it could work. But everything has to be perfect, and with a 3-month-old, you have zero problem-free options if one little thing goes wrong.

Since the odds of a wrinkle-free night are pretty low, you might want to rethink. But then again, I don't know what your problems are if you are forced to not give the game as much attention as you're planning.

 

A fussy baby during post-game interviews would be annoying.

It's worth a shot, I suppose, but I would probably not consider doing it.

 

A three month old is not going to sit still for an entire football game -- even in one of those body carriers where she is strapped to your chest. What is your plan for a blow out diaper? Feeding her? Burping her? There is not way to keep even semi accurate stats with her strapped to you. Also, she is going to want to reach and grab stuff in front of her -- pens, drinks, etc. (my son did when he was three months) How are you going to write with her reaching for you pen?

I have a seven month old. I work from home but he goes to day care during the day because its impossible to get work done with him around. There are some days when he is sick that I keep him in my home office with me, but it's really difficult. He always chooses the conference calls that I have to lead to scream his head off while he is perfectly silent and happy on the ones where I can stay on mute.

 

I brought a six-week old to a live NFL Draft spot I had to do for SportsCenter.

My wife had a work emergency and ESPN had me out at the stadium. I'm not going to lie, I really wanted to do it. I had my six-week old in a car seat and I was dangling keys in front of him up until seconds before I went live. One of the guys who was helping the camera guys had instructions to carry the car seat around the corner if my son started making any noise. Fortunately, it was not an issue.

 

I'm gonna have to vote "no" on this one, Rhody. I remember my attempts to "work" at home when my kids were babies and they all ended in disaster.

When my oldest was a baby, my wife and I had about an hour overlap between our work shifts one day a week. I brought the baby into the newsroom in her little rocking car seat and rocked the car seat with one hand while typing with the other. She was an uncommonly calm and quiet child, but even she was only good with that arrangement for, at most, an hour. If I wasn't finished in that hour's time, she didn't care and she let that be known.

In an absolutely perfect situation -- she sleeps the whole game in perfect weather conditions, every play is a running play so the clock's always running, no overtime, no surprises -- well, even then, I wouldn't do it.

 

There is absolutely no way to do your job properly if you are caring for a 3-month-old for three hours.

 

It's usually Murphy's Law with these kinds of things. I lost track of the number of times my son was sleeping and then the second I got on a call just started screaming at the top of his lungs.

I wonder if there is some way you can park in a place where you can still see the game. I've seen this done more than a few times (although not for child care reasons) where they basically sit on their car and watch the game and then jump back in between series or during timeouts or halftime.

 

I'll sum it up: This is a bad idea.

 

Is there some reason you can't ask a family member to watch the baby or hire a babysitter?

It's what the rest of the world does.

 

Terrible idea.

 

The interviews aren't a problem because we're a weekly; worse case, I can call coaches Saturday.
I think I'm leaning toward bad, so I'm trying to get my father to my house after he's done working to watch her until mrs. rhody comes home. I'd ask my mom, but she's in California with my sister and her boyfriend acting as their nanny for, um, "harvest" season.
It's tough to keep asking family to help, but we really don't have a choice I guess ...