Welcome to Mom and Dad are Fighting Slate's Parenting Podcast for Thursday, April 26th, the Joyless Slogue edition.

I'm Gabriel Roth. I'm an editor at Slate, and I am the father of Eliza, who's seven, and Leo, who is three and three quarters.

I'm Rebecca Lavoie, a podcaster and journalist in New Hampshire, and I am mom to my stepdaughter, Lily, who is 17, my son, Henry, who is 16, and my other son Teddy, who is 15. And I'm Alison Benedict, also an editor at Slate, and the mom of Harry, who is nine, Sam, seven, and Wally Five. Carvel will be back with us next week.

Today on our show, we have a question about teenage drinking,

and we have another about how incredibly difficult and overwhelming it is to have two small children.

Plus, as always, we'll have triumphs and fails.

We'll have recommendations on Slate Plus.

Rebecca has an update on her son's college search and will perhaps have more details on his preference for what I generously referred to a couple weeks ago as stupid crappy colleges.

First, though, it's time for triumphs and fails.

Allison, do you want to go first?

Sure. I'll go first.

Do it.

I have a fail. It's sort of a global long-term fail, but it's been pointed out more recently

to me and clarified that it really is a true fail.

So my husband John and I, we have fairly different, I wouldn't call them philosophies, but

approaches to discipline.

His natural state is to think that every action that is out of line requires a consequence.

And so he's like big, he punishes a lot, not anything like horrific, but like go to your room, no dessert, no TV.

That's like the way that he approaches bad behavior.

And I, I feel like my instinct is not to do that.

But over the years he's worn me down, we fought a lot about it.

And it's just sort of become just like a regular

...