Preparation for parenthood is not just a matter of reading books and decorating the nursery. Here are 12 simple exercises for expectant parents to prepare themselves for the real-life experience of being a mother or father.

1. Women: to prepare for maternity, put on a dressing gown and stick a beanbag down the front. Leave it there for nine months. After nine months, take out 10% of the beans.

2. Men: to prepare for paternity, go to the local chemist, tip the contents of your wallet on the counter, and tell the pharmacist to help himself. Then go to the supermarket. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office. Go home. Pick up the paper. Read it for the last time.
Before you finally go ahead and have children, find a couple who are already parents and berate them about their methods of discipline, lack of patience, appallingly low tolerance levels, and how they have allowed their children to run riot. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child's sleeping habits, toilet training, table manners and overall behaviour. Enjoy it - it'll be the last time in your life that you will have all the answers.

3. To discover how the nights will feel, walk around the living room from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. carrying a wet bag weighing approximately 8-12 lbs. At 10 p.m. put the bag down, set the alarm for midnight, and go to sleep. Get up at twelve and walk around the living room again, with the bag, till 1 am. Put the alarm on for 3 am. As you can't get back to sleep, get up at 2 am and make a drink. Go to bed at 2.45 am. Get up again at 3 am when the alarm goes off. Sing songs in the dark until 4 am. Put the alarm on for 5 am. Get up. Make breakfast. Keep this up for 5 years. Look cheerful.

4. Can you stand the mess children make? To find out, smear peanut butter onto the furniture and jam onto the curtains. Hide a fish finger behind the stereo and leave it there all summer. Stick your fingers in the flowerbeds then rub them on the clean walls. Cover the stains with crayons. How does that look?

5. Dressing small children is not as easy as it seems: first buy an octopus and a string bag. Attempt to put the octopus into the string bag so that none of the arms hang out. Time allowed for this - all morning.

6. Take an egg carton. Using a pair of scissors and a pot of paint turn it into an alligator. Now take a toilet paper tube. Using only sticky tape and a piece of foil, turn it into a Christmas cracker. Last, take a washing up liquid container, a ping pong ball, and an empty packet of Co-co Pops and make an exact replica of the Eiffel Tower. Congratulations. You have just qualified for a place on the play-group committee.

7. Forget the Mini Cooper and buy a Ford. And don't think you can leave it out in the driveway spotless and shining. Family cars don't look like that. Buy a chocolate ice-cream and put in the glove compartment. Leave it there. Get a two euro coin. Stick it in the cassette player. Take a family size packet of chocolate biscuits. Mash them down the back seats. Run a garden rake along both sides of the car. There....... Perfect!!

8. Get ready to go out. Wait outside the toilet for half an hour. Go out the front door. Come back in again. Go out. Come back in. Go out again. Walk- down the front path. Walk back up it. Walk down it again. Walk very slowly down the road for 5 minutes. Stop to inspect minutely every cigarette end, piece of used chewing gum, dirty tissue and each insect along the way. Retrace your steps. Scream that you’ve had as much as you can stand until the neighbours come out and stare at you. Give up and go back into the house. You are now just, about ready to try taking a small child for a walk.

9. Always repeat everything you say at least five times.

10. Go to your local supermarket. Take with you the nearest thing you can find to a pre-school child; a fully grown goat is excellent. If you intend to have more than one child take more than one goa

Your're as welcome as a f*rt in a spacesuit

As funny as a burning orphanage

He's so camp, he shites tent pegs

I'm as sick as a plane to Lourdes

She had a face on her that would drive rats from a barn

Sweatin' like a paedophile in a Barney suit

I'd crawl a million miles across broken glass to kiss the exhaust
of the van that took her dirty knickers to the laundry.

A mickey the size of a double-value can of Right Guard

Jaysus, she could breastfeed a crèche

She's got more chins than a Chinese phone book

Mother Teresa wouldn't kiss her

A sniper wouldn't take her out

Jaysus, ya wouldn't ride her into battle

If I'd a bag of bruised willies I wouldn't give her one

She has a face on her like a bulldog that's just licked p*ss off a Nettle

She wouldn't get a kick in a stampede

She had a f@nny like a badly packed kebab

If I'd a garden full of mickeys I wouldn't let her look over the wall