On the unfairness of the immutability of Time.

As we slowly head into the Middle Years of the strip, it behooves us to remind ourselves of an annoying fact of life: Mike's idiotic belief that if he could somehow make Lizzie go away, he would be able to return to the life he had before she arrived. No one would be yelling at him, no one would be dumping on him about setting a good example, he wouldn't have give everything away and never be allowed to be recognized and he wouldn't have to fight some weak girl all the time. The reason that I mention this is that it never really goes away. Somewhere in the back of his head is the need to punish Lizzie for deliberately deciding to be born just to ruin his day. To admit that she had no control over it is as appalling a prospect to him as the idea that even if Lizzie were to somehow be done away with, he couldn't get his life back.

This makes less than no sense to him because, just as the kid smoking dope in the PSA learned to be an addict by watching his alcoholic father, he learned to rail against how unfair it is that there's no undo button in life from his imbecile parents. While I don't have a camera in Elly's house, I do know people who think and act as she does and one of their favorite things to scream is nonsense about how when her children go away, she can get back to living the wonderful life she was living before the offsprings and small ones ruined it. Given that John says the same stupid thing, it's not hard to see why it is that Mike will die resenting the fact that he can't wish interlopers who HAVE to be out to ruin him away.