Shawn's lies

Another coworker here at the Courier-Post (I'll call him Shawn, because that's this name). Is also having a baby in the next two weeks or so. His wife is expecting about 10 days behind us, but it's starting to look like she might beat Amanda and me to the punch (I've been trying to push down on Amanda's belly, but she insists that's not the way to do it).

Anyway, Shawn and I were talking the other day about 1st-year baby books. We've read all we're going to read on how to deal with pregnancy, but what are we going to read about how to handle the first year of having a baby?

I explained that I had bought a fun book (Safe Baby Handling Tips) giving a number of "Do" and "Don't" options for caring for your baby: "Waking baby," for example, says "Do" next to a mom pleasantly kissing her child on the forhead; and "DON'T" next to the smiling dad with an air horn. "Drying baby" says "Do" next to the mom with a soft towel and "DON'T" next to the dad looking at his watch next to the clothes dryer. (Why is it that the dad is assumed to be the problem parent?)
The book also contains a spinner wheel like on a board game with a number of "mom" and "dad" spots. It's supposed to help you decide who has to change the diaper or whatever other undesirable task needs to be done. It touts its benefits as keeping parents "fair, honest and undivorced."

Anyway, Shawn is leaning toward The Baby Owner's Manual written by a pediatrician and his son in a style like a car-care manual. It talks about the child's "parts" and discusses fuel and such.

This all seemed like a good discussion to have. Then Shawn mentioned his concern over knocking the baby's umbilical cord off early. He was concerned, he said, because it would cause a bunch of bleeding. This sounded like a serious problem I'd never heard of. I though the problem was the thing not coming off.
Then Shawn went on to explain the loss of the umbilical cord would also expose the internal organs as the skin pulled back ... then he started laughing and said he was kidding around.

Kidding? Doesn't he know I'm about to be a dad? This is no time for kidding.
That's it. We're not letting our baby play with Shawn (his wife, however, seems like a nice person. And I'm sure their daughter will take after her).