I had the joy of asking him to pay half of his kid's tuition. His stance on this as of a couple of years ago was, "Private school would be great if it was free," so I haven't spent a lot of time bothering him about money. But I am done working for the school and it is out-of-pocket again, and I have heard rumors that he is being less of a luser, so I thought I'd take a crack at it.

Rather than asking him if he would contribute, I told him what the total was and asked him how he wanted to handle it. We could pay the office separately? He just shut me down. "I owe something? Do I owe you for the other years, too?"

Then he made some vague noises about paying his half up front with the proceeds of the house he just sold, but I will knit myself a vagina suit if he actually pays.

I feel really weird about this, because on one hand, her school is "optional." On the other, we agreed to it in the beginning when she was two and a half and for every year after that. I hadn't even discussed the next school year with him til now, which I guess is my fault?

My face burns every time I think about it today. What do you do in a situation like this, when someone refuses to provide agreed-upon expenses like education and medical? And then they tell you they are optional? But they still want to spend all the 50/50 time they are entitled to. I wish I was woarlike enough to go to court all the time, except I'm not. Not that it would do any good, in the long run.

Then I told him I was having her molars sealed and he said something vague about having dental insurance himself now. That's nice for his new family, I guess. Then he told me he was moving to the island for the summer, and could I keep Franny for a few extra days, because he was in California? And could he make that up later? Yes, you can make that up when I get a check for three grand. LOOOOOL

In Conclusion, bring me:

1. a mai tai
2. Ben Barnes
and
3. a pink taser with kitty head on it!

--David Richo

And now it can be told: school is over and I am so excited I could throw up. I had a few moments there where I almost snapped and ran away and took the children off to the School of Life, aka Piratetry, Mexico, Hoboport, or fill in the blank.

Flack, there was flack, flack ahoy. Like a responsible netizen (oh yers I did) I did not tell you that my big kid was walking by herself to and from school every day. When I moved to this neighborhood, this is something I thought would be a possibility with the children, along with running to the store for bananas, to the methadone clinic, etc, etc. But I thought this would be a far-off future thing, since they are just now able to wash me to my satisfaction with a rag on a stick.

It came up, though, somehow, the walking, and I thought about it. It is all of a couple of blocks, no busy streets are crossed, and school ins and outs times are always broad daylight, as they say.

"Are you sure you want to do this by yourself?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Well, okay."

And she went! A little scared on the first day. There was some hesitancy and some surprise from her teacher, who called me on the first day she was to come home. "She's here and I'm sending her home now, right? Okay?" Right, okay. Her teacher is used to the helicopter parenting, which is about 47 times less amusing than a roflcopter.

And then it got interesting. The sound of chopper blades filled the air. People started cluing in to the fact that Franny was embarking alone daily on a five-minute walk. OMFGBBQ, release the hounds. A parent told her that she should not be walking home by herself, after she and I had decided it was okay and that she was ready. Did you catch that? Another parent told my little fledging independent so-proud-of-herself kid that what she was doing was not okay. Another well-meaning parent offered her a ride. This article flew around the list. Asperations were cast.

Lucky for me, I put my head together with my kid's teacher really quickly. I also talked to my kid. Good job, my kid! Keep up the good work. Her teacher let her lollygag for a few minutes every day so she could avoid the swarming.

But she toughed it out. I tried not to make a big deal about it--she could walk with me, or alone, whatever. I told her I was proud of her, and I was. Letting her have some freedom, is the best thing I can do to let her know that I think she's capable, because she IS. DAMMIT!

In conclusion, the best part was the drunkenness and the bathroom:

SOOOO I think I told you that I dropped a cup size some time in the past few months. I have heard the way cup sizes work is expressed in two ways. One is to measure the boobs in weight, as if they are well, melons, and the other, simpler way is to say that for every cup size, your boobs will stick out more or less one inch, once you cram your junk into the appropriate globulareque shape, instead of what they would be doing on their own after two children, which is trying to get away from you like sea cucumbers.

This means that since I dropped from a D to a C-cup, I have lost, in theory, six ounces, or they have gone in one inch closer to my torso. This means that my boobs weigh somewhere around twenty-one ounces, or roughly a pound and a half. HOWEVER. Dropping from a D-cup to a C-cup has made a major difference somewhere else. My bra straps have gone from a practical and comfortable 3/4"-1" to a flimsy half an inch or less. Once you hit C-cup, they decide you're all smexy and don't need to be practical or have the twenty-one ounces supported properly or something.

In FURTHER conclusion, bra scientists can turn in their badges.

Also Toe Jam.