it sucks to be sick

but that is what I get for standing out in 30 degree temps at 5 am yesterday unloading a 53 ft trailer for work. Actually it started Sunday, when I became very stressed out at work. Getting sick seems to be the way my body reacts to stress of any kind anymore. It's like it really lowers my immune system or something. So today I woke up at 4 am and right off the bat when I hit the bathroom, I coughed up green stuff, and blew yellow stuff and blood out of my nose---for those of you with weak stomachs, I really do apologize. but my stomach was pretty weak when it happened. Then I got to work and got to work on putting out the cologne sets. Yummmmmmmm.....

Not.

My roommate from college got it right when she called me today and said what's with this work stuff? Why can't we be independently wealthy? It's all our parents' fault for not be rich enough to allow us to play through adulthood...........

Believe me, that was ALL sarcasm.....LOL....

Well off to surf some before getting the kiddoes ready for trick or treat........

Happy Halloween y'all......

The saga continues.......

Teenage drama queens........should be outlawed.......

At any rate, we apparently are the cause of the 17 yr old exiling herself once again from this house. She spoiled for a fight Monday, didn't get it, proceeded later on to mouth at me, not talk to me, so when I wouldn't fight, just calmly told her to talk to my face, not around me like I wasn't there, she got all shades of p.o.'d and I finally told her if she wanted to act like a little b****, then fine. And I shut up. She called me a b***** and called her mom to come get her.

Now her dad followed her out the door and told her and her mom a few truths about themselves, and her mom has threatened to beat my ass if I ever talk to her daughter that way again. The child has alienated her grandma, the church secretary, her dad, her sister, etc. Prayer is the only thing we can think of to help. I am, as usual, 100% at fault according to her. Whatever. Her stepdad gets this too, so at least I am not alone. But she sees me as the evil influence. Again, whatever.

It should blow over soon, at least until she feels put upon again. She can;t handle not being the center of attention.

Me, I'd just as soon read.........

WTF--part 3000

The below letter, deleting pertinent names and locations for obvious reasons, is in the mail to the middle school principal, the Superintendent, and the president of the school board. This in in response to a letter that I refused to sign and send back----the school is no longer going to give students a grade of zero on any assignment, because it can "be devastating to the 6 wks grade". Instead, the student is going to have to do lunchtime detention with the teacher to complete the assignment, and if they do not complete it within 2 detentions, then they have to do afterschool detention until it is completed. I would happily provide the text of the letter the school sent home, but my scanner is s***.

"I have read the letter on zero tolerance of zeros that was sent home to be signed by the students and parents. I am not signing and returning it for several reasons.

I do NOT agree with the decision by the Academic Teams leaders/teachers. I firmly believe that there should be personal responsibility, not bail-outs by the staff. While exceptions to every rule do occur, and should be dealt with on a case by case basis, I do not feel a blanket bail-out should exist. I believe this relieves students of being responsible for doing and turning assigned work in on time. I do not feel this is in their best interests, as they will not be allowed to do this in high school or college. It is giving them a false sense of security, that they will always be given extra time or extra chances on anything, and life is not like that. My children are taught this from an early age, and have had to bear responsibility when, by their fault, they have received zeroes or lower grades due to an assignment not being done as it should.

I find this policy to be unacceptable for that and also for the fact for many students, the school bus is their only way home from school. Should it get to the point that a child should be forced to attend after school detention to avoid the zero, then how do they get home? Many parents work, and may not be able to get away to ensure their child gets home.

I have talked about this policy change with several parents as well as those in the workforce and those involved in higher education, most notably a Marshall professor with 25 years of college-level teaching experience. All have said this policy is a very bad mistake. As stated earlier, there are no do-overs in college. No one is going to check over a student’s shoulders to make sure that he/she is doing their work. It is up to the student. It is called personal responsibility. If a child must receive the zero to get the point across that doing the assigned work is mandatory to pass the class and move on, then so be it. If we do not teach our children this lesson at a young age, they are certainly not going to learn it when they get older. When are they supposed to learn this?

Obviously there are those parents who simply do not care, nor wish to be bothered with the details of their child’s education. Shame on them, but the school system simply cannot afford to pander to the self esteems and fragile egos of students and parents by promoting the “no-zero’s” standard. In doing so, the system is merely protecting it’s own interests, not those of the students, who will one day be forced to realize that the “protection” they were given in middle school is gone and real life is in front of them, and they are not going to be capable of dealing with it. Playing with the numbers to make one’s institution appear to be meeting standards is, simply put, fraud.

I would ask that the committees or whoever made such a decision would rethink it. I am also forwarding a copy of this, as well as the letter that was sent home, to the school board. While I am sure they have had a hand in approving this, I am making them aware of at least this parent’s feelings on this.

Thank you,"

Think about it----how many do-overs do you get in life? How many people----friends, relatives, coworkers, etc., do you know who never had to be responsible for anything growing up , and now are faced with the horrible realization that no one is going to do it for them?

I fear greatly for the future if this kind of crap is not stopped.

Beyond the realm of stupidity....

That would be the WV legislature. Not to mention all of us who let it slide when the legislature threw out the provision that in order to home school your child, you had to have been educated a minimum of 4 years beyond the grade you are teaching. Makes sense, doesn't it. I do sort of remember a flap at the time about the provision keeping parents without a college degree or some post high school education from teaching their children at home beyond the grade school years.

Ok, let's get to the heart of my being so pissed off I can barely see to type. Yes my blood pressure is probably that high. My husband's ex, give her the benefit of the doubt (which I honestly doubt she deserves, but...) has mentioned that in order to keep their younger daughter from "straying" or in other words, being a teenager and rebelling (more on that topic later--it's a long story to which I don't quite have all sides of yet), she is threatening to pull her out of high school and home school her. After a small go-round this afternoon with the older child, a senior, over why the younger did not come here on the afternoon school bus as she was supposed to (part again of the long story), I called the local school board to find out what the minimum requirements to home school were.

Imagine my utter shock when I was told that it was to have at least a GED. OH PUHLEEZE. I will concede that having a GED does not mean you are stupid. It does not necessarily mean you couldn't hack it in the minimum high school program. I know there are various reasons for not obtaining a high school diploma, such as family hardships, i.e. having to go to work to be the support of your family and probably a host of other valid reasons. I would even include the total lack of personnel in the school system who even give a holy crap about anything about you, much less try to help you.

However, in this world today, a good education is mandatory for any level of success. At minimum, a high school diploma from an accredited high school, preferably a post high school education of some sort. I don't mean it has to be a traditional 4+yr college with a bachelor's degree and beyond. Junior college---like the local business and technical school, or the vo-tech to get mechanical training and the like. Something to enhance your chances of making enough of a living to support yourself and family without having to resort to welfare.

Yes, I have a bachelor's degree. It was great for getting me my first post-college salaried position, possibly even my second. But after that, all it did was put me more years in debt than I ever dreamed of being, and even more than that, it helped to teach me how to reason, how to learn what I do not know, how to successfully deal with people in life. Now, my upbringing had quite a lot to do with that as well, as has my own common sense (yeah I know, that's debatable). But I have enough common sense to know that with only a diploma from a, sorry Mom, backwoods-later-to-be-taken-over-by-the-state high school, (and Mom, she graduated 20+ yrs after you did), I would not have the balls to pull my child out of school to homeschool her simply because I do not like some of the people she is hanging around. Which is what it boils down to.

But unfortunately, because the WV legislature has given her the right to do so, she can, without a by-your-leave from anyone, even the child's father. So that gives us one less piece of leverage to use to gain custody. Which is something we are seriously looking at, and the child in question is 15 now, not 7. So she herself can pretty well choose to stay with us.

And I don;'t think necessarily that you have to have a college degree to be a good parent and want the best for your kid, but if you are going to educate them yourself, would you not want to be several years ahead of the child in education? I would. Simply to keep enough ahead of the child to be effective in my teaching. I have had family members who have homeschooled their kids, most in the grade school years, and then putting them into regular school to complete their diploma requirements. These people are not dummies. They kept their children home when they were young, instilled the values as well as the knowledge to help them succeed in life--and high school, and then let the schools teach them. These kids are still young--as I look at them from the back side of 40, but they seem to get along alright.

But I do not want to see my bright, individual, unique stepdaughter yanked from her friends and school to sit at home and be taught, or not, by her mom, when I feel her opportunities would be severely limited by such action.

When I get the rest of the long story, I may change my mind as far as she is concerned, but I doubt it at this point, based on past history. But I still give huge thumbs down to our state legislature, and all of us parents who didn't call them on it soon enough, for throwing out a provision that , to my mind, would ensure a better education for our homeschooled kids overall.

No offense intended to those who are doing their job right.........