School Holidays SUCK

"Let's get one thing straight", I said to The Youth this morning as they whipped up their 457th origami crane to add to the collection which I will later be called on to purchase from their 'shop'. "We're not spending any money today, okay. We're not buying any Strawberry Squeezes from Boost Juice, we're not going to the cinema, we're not even getting a box of orange Tic-Tacs at the service station." This news went down like the proverbial lead balloon, and their tiny little minds started ticking over almost immediately. How were they going to vanquish this parsimonious malcontent they had before them?
As I see it, the whole game of master and slave is a relentless exercise in autocracy and degrading submissions. Regrettably, The Youth have sussed this and are using it to their advantage. They know that a war of attrition is the ideal way to achieve their goals, and that school holidays are the parents' Achilles Heel.
With this ammunition in their holsters, they began their assault early. Could they watch a movie before breakfast? Absolutely not. Could they check their emails? No. Could they have pancakes for breakfast? Are you joking. With my despotic reputation intact, the Infantry decided to make their move. I want a haircut today. Can we go to Alice's house? What are we doing today?...You get the idea. My armour was slipping, and it was only 7.15am.
Weet-bix were eaten, clothes were donned, travel was undertaken and we found ourselves at the Museum where I had booked them into a FREE children's show where the little blighters were required to do things maritime: scrub decks, haul supplies, eradicate rats, you know the stuff. After an hour they came off the 'ship', huddled, conferred and arrived at the universal opinion that the show was 'for babies'. 
Was Dostoevsky talking about me when he said in The Idiot, 'The soul is healed by being with children'?