ARVADA, CO — A group of the country's leading parent scientists announced this week that they were now very close to discovering what the heck you're supposed to do to a kid after you've counted to three.
"We've been working on this for decades," Professor Dexter Portsmith announced at a press conference. "We've run the equation through thousands of simulations and we think we're very close to solving this very complex problem. We've figure out what to do at numbers one and two and we're very close to breaking through to determining what should be done after you reach number three."
The scientists said they had tried putting kids in timeout after number three but that didn't seem to work. They also reportedly tried taking away a toy, telling them Santa Claus was mad at them, and forcing them to watch The View — all punishments that had little to no impact on the kids' behavior.
"I just don't know what on earth I'm supposed to do!" local mom Cheryl Gibbons said. "I hope they figure this thing out soon because I'm at my wits end with my toddler. I hear other moms count to three and but I never really see them do anything after. I tried it once, but my toddler just yelled 'four!'"
At publishing time, parent scientists also announced that they believe they're very close to discovering the appropriate response when your toddler dumps five pounds of birdseed all over your bed and then takes a permanent marker to your bathroom walls.
Citing concerns about stiff competition from Amazon and an impossible-to-please Gen Z, Santa has announced he's hanging up the hat for good.
