Problem: Can I Take My Baby Monitor to the Bar?

Q: My husband and I live above a bar and, naturally, patronize it several times a week. It does not serve food, so according to state law, minors cannot enter. This has not been a problem for us so far, but we are expecting the arrival of our very first minor in just a few weeks. Can we leave a sleeping baby in our apartment and go down to the bar? It is right downstairs, easily within the range of our baby monitor. People have babies in those giant suburban houses with, like, five floors, and nobody says anything.

—L.P.
Dover, Del.

Dear L.P.,

I think this is a question better directed to Parenting magazine. Or maybe Alcoholics Anonymous. But let me give it a shot: no, you may not go down to the bar to drink while your baby is alone in your apartment. However, why don’t you try re-creating a barlike atmosphere in your apartment? Leave your baby monitor downstairs and listen to the sounds of your friends getting drunk while you do the same, but in close proximity to your baby.