tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20838813422319822952024-02-07T14:01:42.173-05:00Appian WayHome wasn't built in a day.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.comBlogger44125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-45298006265510702312012-10-28T09:55:00.001-04:002012-10-28T14:45:02.306-04:00Setting the BarI was traveling for business last week, and while I was gone I got a lot of reading done. Reread <i>Adopting the Hurt Child</i> by Gregory Keck and <i>Beyond Logic, Consequences and Control</i> which, judging by the footnotes, was written directly in response to Keck, and both of them read like Manuals for Parents who are Fragile, Controlling, Needy Dips. BLCC walks the reader through an example of a mother who says that conversations with her daughter like this one had taken all the joy out of parenting:
<blockquote>Mother: So, how was your first day back at school?
</br>Daughter: Fine
</br>Mother (teeth on edge, tries again): On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you say it was?
</br>Daughter: It was a B+
</br>Mother: Why are you always so stubborn?</blockquote>
But now, by using the techniques taught in the book, that mother has learned to get the hell over herself already.
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The parenting book that hands down I liked best was <i>How to Talk so Your Kids Will Listen & Listen so Your Kids Will Talk</i>, which basically I read as "your kids are not automatons who have to be happy all the time or suppress their disappointment and anger and frustrations. Set boundaries about the way you expect them - and everybody - to treat you, teach them to set boundaries by respecting them, teach them to solve problems for themselves by backing off and leaving them to work things out on their own, help them use creative and physical outlets to work out their big feelings, and acknowledge and validate their small ones." There are techniques for doing this, like "describe what you see" and "grant wishes in fantasy," but basically the book is about offering kids a little respect.
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I plan on re-reading How to Listen very soon, because unfortunately, while I was reading it the first time, I was switching between it and Shirer's <i>The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich</i>, and I think I may have gotten the two of them mixed up a little, like: if your child says "I want to overthrow Bavaria," you can avoid a tantrum by granting the wish in fantasy - and the bigger the better!
<blockquote>Kid (pouting): I want to take over Bavaria!
</br>Parent: What would you do with Bavaria?
</br>Kid: I'd use it as a stepping stone to dismantle the Weimar Republic.
</br>Parent: Wow, if you had control of the Weimar Republic, you could use that to dissolve the Federalist system in Germany!
</br>Kid: I could! I could unite all of Germany!
</br>Parent: Wow! All of Germany!
</br>Kid: I could take over Austria!
</br>Parent: And the Sudetenland!
</br>Kid: And the rest of Czechoslovakia!
</br>Parent: And Poland!
</br>Kid: And Russia!
</br>Parent: Today, Bavaria, tomorrow the world!
</br>Kid: Thanks, Dad. I guess I don't need to take over Bavaria, I'm just going to go play with my stormtroopers for four years.</blockquote>
Parenting! I haz it!jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-38780782907415338742012-10-18T10:40:00.000-04:002012-10-18T14:28:51.940-04:00About that oncoming train...The closer I get to an event, the more anxious I get for it to arrive. And who doesn't experience this? Does a bride lose interest in the wedding as it approaches? Does a new job lose its lustre the week before orientation? Are children ever as wound up with anticipation about Christmas in September as they are on Christmas Eve? (when Christmas transforms from a season of wonders and delight into an endurance event, a triathalon of cooking, shopping and decorating, Christmas Eve becomes the first moment in a month in which a person can sit and breathe, knowing that if it isn't done already, it's not going to happen, but that is not the point here, and I ask, dear reader, for you to remember back to a simpler, happier time, when you were nine years old, wearing footie pajamas, and Christmas was a magical, wondrous time, all thanks to somebody else doing all the freakin' work).
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As our homestudy nears its completion, it is natural for our feelings of anticipation to heighten, but when you are adopting, when you are going through the home study process, the important thing to remember is: <b>nothing about you is normal, natural, or right</b>.
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Expectant biological parents may refer to their incipient offspring unit by any terminology they please, and everyone coos and sighs over how cute their pet name is (my favorite name, given by friends to their incoming infant: Particle). We have been thinking and talking to each other and friends for months about our approaching adoption, wouldn't it be weird if we didn't have a name we've given to the Kiddo? And there it is, he is The Kiddo. It's an expression of affection, endearment, not specific to any age, gender, or personality trait. And apparently, it's <i>wrong</i>.
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Says the therapist: "this is not 'the kid' you're talking about, this is <i>your child</i>." "My child" is, by the way, the <i>only</i> acceptable nomenclature - "my son" is right out. If I say "I don't know him yet, I don't know who he is, what his history is, what he's like, what I'll love best about him, what he'll like about me, or even if he'll ever feel anything toward me but hostility, but he's my son and it is painful to me to think of him going through this holiday season not knowing that there's a real couple out there who wants him and wants him to come home, even if he doesn't fully believe that somebody wanting him is possible" - and that's close to a quote - the reaction is "why do you say 'son?' Would you be unable to accept a daughter?"
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So why do we say son? I am a working mother, B is a stay-at-home father, and over 80% of children in foster care have experienced sexual abuse - often while in foster care, at the hands of other children. I trust B implicitly, but would a girl, of any age, who has been abused by men, be well served by being alone with a man for several hours a day? Neither does it seem fair to B, to either put him at risk of a false accusation or to subject him to being the primary caregiver for a child whose anxiety is exacerbated by his presence. Instead, we focus on the positives, that we have a great male role model who could be of great benefit to a boy who has been without one. Says the therapist: "when you explain it that way it's clear that there's logical thought behind it, but when you just refer to your child as your son, it can make people concerned." John Cullum can holler It's a Boy and then turn on a dime when his granddaughter is born and it's endearing; adoptive parents, don't think you can be like normal parents and that will be ok, because you can't and it won't.
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The acceptable adoptive parent fully realizes the future relationship that he or she may be denied by a third party before it ever happens, fully engaging with the unknown child, not as a person but as a role. That is, the adoptive parent must envision having a child but not knowing a person; the adoptive parent is fully disengaged from any anticipation of the qualities their child might have, only what behaviors he or she will engage in. Adoptive parents are expected to be like Julie Andrews in <i>The Sound of Music</i>, knowing nothing about the children they will be caring for except that there are seven of them. Also, instead of meeting the children the day after she's told about them, in this musical, Julie Andrews goes through a six month screening and training montage (even Rocky had a montage!) in which she is expected to remain incurious about and detached from the children she was told about in scene 1.
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Do biological parents get tut-tutted if they let slip that they vacillate from day to day between excitement and unsurety about the big event looming in their lives? If they express a hope that infant arrives before this holiday or that anniversary, does this excite criticism? My youngest brother was born one day after what would have been our great-grandfather's 100th birthday. If the standards applied to adoptive parents were applied to biological ones, My father's thought before the birth that it would be nice if Danny arrived on the actual day would raise concern among professionals, as possibly foretokening an inability to bond with his son, should he not measure up to his parent's ideals.
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Maybe it's just this particular therapist. When we talked about our feelings about fertility and our lack thereof, I was emphatic that not only do I not endow fertility with feelings of self-worth, I conciously refuse to do so, dating back to long before we had any idea that infertility would be an issue. I explained that, to me, life is full of paths and producing offspring is just one of those paths, one that not everybody chooses, that my choice to adopt is not one that I see as a second choice to biological parenthood, but as an exciting life's work in its own right, that, even if creating a new child is as important, valuable or meaningful as opening a new life to an underappreciated child, that biological parenthood cannot help but be more ordinary, more commonplace, less interesting, less exciting than the path that we are on. I told her that, as I see it now, had we become biological parents, it would have been a hindrance to pursuing something that I now see as my life's mission. Says the therapist (with urgency): "but you can see how other people wouldn't feel that way?" Thinks me: "so the f--- what?"
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My G-d, does she want us to conform. She's not in any insurance network and doesn't file claims herself. When I called to set up the initial appointment she was very concerned about whether our insurance would cover our sessions. I told her since she's out of network, the coverage would be minimal and since it's for an assessment, not for therapy, unlikely that they'll cover it at all, but even if that's the case, it doesn't really matter, since she's the person the agency told us to see to get assessed and cleared for adoption and we consider this to be simply one of the costs of the process. This <i>bothered</i> her. She was reluctant to book the appointment without me checking with the insurance company first. And then, at our first session, she wanted to go over it again. Yesterday she seemed to finally give up on the insurance and move on to parking - she had sent an email that said that parking was available in the lot across the street, but come into the building and check with the doorman about which spaces in the lot are ok and which ones aren't... so we just did on the street parking a block away and enjoyed the walk. This was apparently not acceptable. Unsolicited: "Where did you park?" I just found a space up the street. "Because you know, they ticket here if you aren't careful." Yes, I know, I went to the university two blocks east of here and I lived for seven years in an apartment about a mile west. "You don't care if you get a ticket?" I parked a block west of here, where you don't need a permit. "But there's a lot across the street." Yes, I saw that, I decided to park a block away and walk. I'd been driving for an hour and I knew that I'd be sitting in here for an hour and I felt like stretching my legs. "On your way out, check with the doorman about which spaces in the lot you can use next time."
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B expresses that as a result of his childhood, he is hypervigilant about physical threats, and that's not his most attractive or engaging quality now, but it's quirky and interesting and when the zombie apocalypse finally gets off its butt and shows up, we'll all be grateful that B has an office stocked with gas masks and geiger counters (both kinds!) Whatever, he's very aware of physicality and works out a lot because he wants to feel strong. Says the therapist: "is a thirteen year old boy right for you? He might get aggressive." Says B: "I'm 220 pounds and an ex-Army Ranger." Says me: "so, in her world, risk awareness increases the risk? It's like, if somebody told her that he's a very cautious driver and always comes to a complete stop at intersections, she'd ask, if he thinks that driving isn't completely safe, why he ever takes the highway?"
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I engage life with a sense of humor and an appreciation for the absurd. When people behave offensively or intrusively, I tend give my inner Dorothy Parker a little more rein, redirecting instead of confronting the offensive party. Says the therapist: "your sense of humor can be off-putting. Try to stop, reflect, and control yourself before you make those remarks." I remark on the general efficacy of unsolicited advice. Says the therapist: "that's the sort of thing you should stop saying."
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I <b>HATE</b> this process, where everything is torn apart, second guessed, judged, where we live for months in anticipation, not being sure if, in the end, we will be found acceptable by this agency as prospective adoptive parents. We are living a year in limbo. Says the therapist: "you seem anxious and very keyed into what you think are delays, but six months really isn't very long to be waiting. I'm concerned that this child will introduce stress that will cause you to experience anxiety." The snappy comeback I didn't deliver would have made her happy that it was not delivered, if she knew it existed in the first place, which she couldn't because she'd told me to keep it to myself. I think I'm making progress.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-38854732364966864382012-09-26T21:28:00.000-04:002012-09-26T21:28:36.378-04:00What a long, strange road it's been...We got the house and... waited. B just wasn't quite there yet. Earlier this year, I offered him that we could do one more round of fertility treatments if afterwards we could get moving on the adoption. That was this spring, we started the home study process again in late May and we had a home visit. Everything is in order, we can't tell that there's anything left outstanding, and... it should be another month or so and then we'll have final approval. I'm really hoping for placement by Christmas.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-809191656653468702012-07-23T09:41:00.000-04:002012-07-23T09:55:25.078-04:00RevolutionHi to the small group of everybody who is following this blog. There's some to catch you up on.<br />
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First of all, our first foray into adoption fizzled. I found out that it wasn't going anywhere when I overheard The Husband talking to a friend and saying "things are going so good right now, I don't want to change anything." Which was, needless to say, aggravating, but whutcanudo? So that was in the spring of 2011, I waited a year and we talked about it again, and I offered that we could go for another round of infertility treatments, but at the end of those, if we weren't pregnant, I wanted his promise that we'd go ahead with the adoption.<br />
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So, this past May was all kinds of fun. My body reacted to the Clomid with pregnancy symptoms and for a little while we thought that we might actually be pregnant, but the stick never turned blue. The doc ran some blood tests and came back with a diagnosis of Low Ovarian Reserve, said the words "egg donor" and that was the end of that. We are now off to the races on getting ready for a kiddo.<br />
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We're getting back on track, and that's great. I didn't write in the interval because a hundred posts about "I want a kid but B is scared so we're not going to get a kid and boy am I pissed" isn't really either enlightening or therapeutic.<br />
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Our second home visit is a little over a week away. The house is a wreck. We're putting a new floor in upstairs, replacing the carpeting with bamboo one room at a time. We've decked out the kiddo's room (formerly the guest room). It used to be furnished with a boxspring and mattress that rested on the floor, a folding chair beside it as an end table, and a hand-me-down IKEA dresser. The dresser's still in there, but now we've added a real bedframe, a matching end table, and a bookcase. When I came home with the bookcase, B made a comment about that room now being the best furnished room in the house.<br />
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In other news, shopping clearance furniture at World Market, you find some fabulous deals.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-73672085745544261102010-07-26T15:39:00.002-04:002010-07-26T15:47:45.290-04:00Adendum to Murphy's LawThe day after your family and friends get together and help you move that &($^%&** piano that you promised them they would never have to move again, you will receive no less than 10 inquiries regarding your advertisement of a Free Piano.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-17287908496493374062010-07-20T16:06:00.001-04:002010-07-20T16:07:05.733-04:00OMG houses are expensiveWent to Lowe's over the lunch break. Then went into shock when I saw the bill...jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-88365484180677163502010-07-19T10:33:00.003-04:002010-07-19T11:20:04.572-04:00Everything Old is New AgainI love my new house. I especially like that it's mine.<br /><br />But night before last, I was talking to B and said "you know what? It's official. There isn't a single light fixture in this house that I don't want to replace."<br /><br />"Even the dining room chandelier that's held up with a piece of rope?"<br /><br />"Nope, not my style. I do like the rope though."<br /><br />B feels the same way about the plumbing fixtures. <em>All</em> the plumbing fixtures. The diverter valves in all the showers are blown - when you try to take a shower, you get a trickle out of the shower and a deafening waterfall out of the tub faucet. B has replaced one of the faucets so far, the other two showers are still on our Lowe's list. But that still leaves the faucets, the toilet seats... the sink stopper in the upstairs hall bathroom broke last night and when I tried to close it, it stayed closed. B fixed it, for now at least. One more thing on the Lowe's list.<br /><br />I tried putting something away on a shelf in the kitchen and discovered when the shelf wobbled crazily and deposited its load back on the counter. Lowe's list.<br /><br />It's a twenty year old house and we knew what we were getting when we made the offer. And I don't mean to suggest that we bought a fixer, we just bought a twenty year old house that has never been updated in any way. And we did this on purpose, we chose this over new construction that we could have chosen all the finishing for. We did this not (only) to save money, but because we relish the chance to make it our own by making these changes ourselves, one at a time.<br /><br />This weekend, I tried to put a huge cutting board away in a cabinet that was perfect - narrow & tall - for holding large cutting boards and cookie sheets. When I tried to put it in though, I discovered that the cabinet also had a shelf in the back of it. B + 1 hammer + 5 minutes = perfection. The cutting board is snug now in its new home with the cookie sheets.<br /><br />Bliss.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-69545238586930849692010-07-15T11:02:00.004-04:002010-07-15T11:27:23.826-04:00Entendez-vous dans les Campagnes?We closed on Bastille day. It's fitting in its way. I had visions in the morning of us emerging from our apartment into the sunlight, rubbing our eyes, and marching down the street toward liberation. At which point I remembered that glorious, inspirational demeanor of the actual head of the original parade out of the Bastille was a man who had been imprisoned there because he was under the delusion that he was Julius Ceasar. In all the excitement of the people rising and creating a grand republic, they lined up to parade behind a would-be tyrant. It really ruined the metaphor, but what the heck.<br /><br />There was much driving back and forth yesterday, and there was outright panic from Holly. After six weeks of slowly growing anxiety, yesterday morning it really came to a head. She started the day by making a break for it out the door, and nothing would calm her down except letting her get in the car. She's been running and roughhousing with Minnie since we got to the house yesterday, and burned some of the frantic crazy off in the process, but it's going to be a while before she's convinced and settles in. She slept between us last night (which is very unusual), ending up this morning jammed in between the pillows, curled up at both our heads.<br /><br />We had a last minute of comedy. The keys to the deadbolts for the back doors had never been available while the house was being shown, and our agent tried to track them down for us yesterday. She sent me the email trail at the end of it because it was so unbelievable - the sellers are saying that in the ten years they owned the house they never had keys for the back doors, both of which open to the deck.<br /><br />(Before you say "you want to rekey anyway" - yes, we know that. But if the door is deadbolted shut, to rekey it you either have to drill out the lock or take the door off its hinges before you can remove the old lock (if it was easy to remove a locked deadbolt there wouldn't be much point in having one in the first place). We're at the point of laughing about all this though - it's all no end of crazy).<br /><br />When we went to bed last night, B was talking about how great it was to know what he's going to do the next day, and to know that there's so much that needs doing and that he knows how to do, and he was awake and dressed before 8 this morning. I am loving this house owning thing.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-89931992979500897432010-07-09T00:50:00.004-04:002010-07-09T01:02:03.302-04:00Puppy Pics<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ9kTHbFhEC5KvDhjmCiGEqa88GM4Zwn5YjZd8r6xpQagBRz-1mtqCTezZ7W7TlPtu3OikeRYFsFiJ-RplKzVsVDP8tvvSR107PYmz9UMiufEJYY3AwCOCk4K4OBMXQgt5GeK8Ez0S4yI/s1600/DSCN0482.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5491767009549193586" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ9kTHbFhEC5KvDhjmCiGEqa88GM4Zwn5YjZd8r6xpQagBRz-1mtqCTezZ7W7TlPtu3OikeRYFsFiJ-RplKzVsVDP8tvvSR107PYmz9UMiufEJYY3AwCOCk4K4OBMXQgt5GeK8Ez0S4yI/s320/DSCN0482.JPG" /></a> The pic of Minnie holding the monkey is from her first night with us. The one with her playing with Holly is more recent - you can see all the packing going on in the background.<br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRtLE4u9Tww2wCJfYlqYYUsYoPFEUv3RaTHCnKCn60n5m_jWUUTe3jKEbstLLg6aU0APx3Rhgmrlcwbt5bMA3Xpo4-NB5kudjjp2IZ7wASG9hsWbAuEdvrE1Rq7ZPf5c2v7agEbd9VzWs/s1600/DSCN0451.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5491767000589044002" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRtLE4u9Tww2wCJfYlqYYUsYoPFEUv3RaTHCnKCn60n5m_jWUUTe3jKEbstLLg6aU0APx3Rhgmrlcwbt5bMA3Xpo4-NB5kudjjp2IZ7wASG9hsWbAuEdvrE1Rq7ZPf5c2v7agEbd9VzWs/s320/DSCN0451.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMiP6dVdEcq4obi3OhDyiBGmeWYTV3jlJNf81KwESDZS4I4RbttFZRKHyFtPwYi5kSL3qM20oW1avE2P6KMlvdhtAaqia0JI5UkgjdBDz-zvhraynzQQPaLdEPu8frUUkDAi1w5fZY_2A/s1600/DSCN0482.JPG"></a><br /><br /><br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUv3UhedTgHw6WDZosYcWYUmvRkHEc0iski740k6MrRsWHzFFdKKQl90KUt51iU-LQDlF_HHaIHfQMDuHN7ZaBbDiQhNgmB7ErdS9ZW9ixelprfkF9kK2joSt7EdYRAwp3oSw4RODcA9E/s1600/DSCN0458.JPG"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5491765373757451106" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUv3UhedTgHw6WDZosYcWYUmvRkHEc0iski740k6MrRsWHzFFdKKQl90KUt51iU-LQDlF_HHaIHfQMDuHN7ZaBbDiQhNgmB7ErdS9ZW9ixelprfkF9kK2joSt7EdYRAwp3oSw4RODcA9E/s320/DSCN0458.JPG" /></a> Puppy pics have been requested. This is Minnie between 6 and 7 weeks. She's... substantially larger now.<br /><br /><br /><br /><div></div><br /><br /><br /><div></div></div></div></div>jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-39108672130758421902010-07-08T18:45:00.003-04:002010-07-08T19:08:26.607-04:00Back in the Saddle AgainI really couldn't bear to look at this blog over the past year. It's been an agonizing holding pattern. Looking at the date on the last entry, I realize that it's almost exactly a year to the day after I wrote that that we finally made an offer on a house. And today, we got the notice that we're clear to close! We sign the papers on Tuesday afternoon and start picking up where we left off.<br /><br />Has it been a lost year? Yes and no. I've had a lot going on at work, and work has been going very well for me, but I don't think that would have been materially different if things had gone smoothly a year ago. It's made a vast deal of difference, for the better, in B's life though. He's progressed a lot with how to deal with stress and how to recognize and cope with his co-dependent tendencies that I don't think would have been as easy if he was trying to parent. During this last year, he actually stated a preference as though it was no big deal. Which was a very big deal.<br /><br />We got a much better deal on the house we ended up with than we could have on the house we had initially wanted. And we got a fantastic deal on the loan. Financially, this was a very good delay.<br /><br />Balance that against the guilt from knowing that some kid, somewhere out there, spent an extra year waiting for a forever family. I'm able to be rational about it now, but I suspect that when some kid becomes <em>my</em> kid there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth. On the inside.<br /><br />B has asked for a little time to get settled in before we start the home study, and I can't say no. My youngest brother is getting married at the end of September and we'll have a full house for the week of the wedding, plus we've volunteered to host the rehearsal dinner/backyard barbecue, and B has said that as soon as the wedding is done and behind us that he's good to go to start moving on getting kids home, but he thinks it's a bad idea to compound the stress. And he's right, but I hate to admit it.<br /><br />That's the drama-light version of this past year. We waited around and worked a lot, then we got a house. The end.<br /><br />Oh, and there's a new puppy. And she's adorable.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-65786016699557688792009-05-18T15:34:00.003-04:002009-05-18T16:37:27.997-04:00What to do?Our timeline had been to be making an offer on a house by... right about now.<br /><br />But, it's looking more and more like it's going to take longer (our biggest hint: we aren't making an offer right now. That's how we know it's going to be sometime in the future.) For one thing, our credit report has some old stuff on it that should have come off because it was paid in full or aged off a long time ago, but even some of the things that were paid in full, the companies/agencies who reported them never reported that they'd been paid. Instead, they changed their names slightly every month to keep the now inaccurate entries constantly current. A credit card that I paid off and closed in 1993 is still on my report. And, because we're going for an FHA loan and credit is tight right now, it all has to come off - all of it - before we can get approved. We're working as fast as we can on getting this done.<br /><br />Which is just as well, because we've discovered that getting out of our lease is going to be harder than we'd thought. We sent in our letter of intent not to renew our year-to-year lease three months in advance of the anniversary date, as required. Our landlord sent us back a letter informing us that because only B signed the letter, it didn't meet the conditions for not renewing and our lease is now automatically extended to July 31, 2010. If we want to get out of it before then, we have to pay the landlord a $1k non-refundable extra-special-permission bonus and then find someone else to rent the apartment at our own expense.<br /><br />I've started tracking down other people who are in the same boat with this Fan Apartments as we are - there are at least a dozen I've found already - and one of them told me that Fan Apartments has turned down three applicants for his place already, and he's still on the hook for rent and responsible for finding a new tenant, even though he's already done a walk-through and turned in the keys.<br /><br />So, long story short, we figure at this point our best bet is to take a breather, be happy that the time pressure is off, work more on getting all the crud off our credit reports and becoming perfect little mortgage-seekers, and then, when we're all ready to go, call the Fire Marshall. Fan Apartments is a repeat offender for chaining and padlocking shut the fire escape on this building. Any port in a storm, right?<br /><br />Ye gods, I really do loathe this kind of purposeless difficulty. And I still have to call the agency to let them know that our timeline has changed.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-25239960930306130922009-04-27T09:20:00.002-04:002009-04-27T09:29:02.907-04:00GrumpykinsI've been in pain every time I walk (and quite often when I'm not walking) for weeks now, thanks to this wart on my heel that went ballistic and had to be removed, which meant cutting out a big chunk o' heel. It's the limping that's getting to me, throwing everything else out of whack, straining tendons and joints. I'm miserable and stressed to the breaking point, crying a lot over nothing, insomnia, etc. So, if I'm sounding extra-bitchy... that's why.<br /><br />The good news is: it's healing. This is not the way things are always going to be, this is temporary, and recovery is on its way. We're focusing on that. The other good news is that the husband that drives me up the wall is also the same husband who has been taking care of me, bringing me things, changing the dvd, getting me food, and just being within earshot whenever I take a shower, just in case I slip and fall... everyone should be so lucky as to have a B like my B.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-37112770797027373462009-04-22T18:52:00.003-04:002009-04-22T22:11:13.064-04:00NumbersDays until Sims 3 is released: 40<br />Days until every single thing in the history of time is cleared off of my credit report so that I can get a mortgage: 15 to 45<br />Days until I have to give my landlord notice or else renew my lease for another year: 7<br />Total dollar amount of all items keeping me from making an offer today: <span style="font-family:lucida grande;">$</span>2,087.43<br />Days left to prepare a level 1 D&D adventure: 10-20<br />NPCs created for adventure so far: 116<br />Days left to prepare for seminar on programming for EAV table structures: 2<br />Slides ready for seminar: 1. Well, almost 1.<br />Max size of sibling group we'll consider adopting: 3<br />Min age of oldest child in group: 12<br />Approximate times I've been told that teens are hard and sibling groups might "gang up on me": 15,000,012<br /><br />If anybody who has adopted teens or sib groups happens to read this post, did you experience the same reaction coming from family and friends? My friends and co-workers almost universally report that teens drive them crazy. My otherwise supportive family practically turns into concern trolls when I mention the possibility of a sib group. I see it as a kid with an intact relationship and support network; they get very wide eyed, exhale audibly and say "three is a lot of kids."<br /><br />And for the record, I <span style="font-style: italic;">like</span> teens. They're just like adults but thinner, with less money and more drama. Being around teens is like being a fan of a low-budget soap opera.<br /><br />UPDATE: so, I opened up the EAV presentation file to work on it, but instead of doing that, um, I did <a href="http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=20343#comment-1212537">this</a>.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-73915326239898628192009-04-16T21:46:00.003-04:002009-04-17T00:31:37.335-04:00Adoption MeetingThe blog is going slowly, I know. I'm trying to stick to adoption issues and, occasionally, work stuff for filler. Otherwise, I'd be putting up lots of posts about politics, links to things like this <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNAnUygqOYc&feature=rec-HM-fresh+div">video of a robot which solves Rubik's Cubes</a> in which the newscaster asserts that a cube has five sides and that the robot's best solve time (26 seconds) is "almost double" the fastest human time (10 seconds). I weep for humanity.<br /><br />Or, I would be linking other videos like <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY&feature=related">this one</a>, which I've watched a dozen times today and it makes me cry and smile and I love it. I'm still weeping for humanity, but in a completely different way.<br /><br />We had a meeting at the adoption agency yesterday. We went back over our opening <a href="http://hivementality.blogspot.com/2009/01/crisis-of-confidence.html">checklist</a>. The difficult part is that the goal is to be "open" with the agents, but it felt like everything we said just opened us up to misunderstanding. It went like this:<br /><br /><blockquote><span style="font-weight: bold;">Agent:</span> You've signed the agreement not to use corporal punishment, and you've been to the classes that have talked about discipline methods. Could you talk about how you were disciplined growing up and what your philosophy is with regards to discipline?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Me:</span> I remember when my father announced that he'd decided that spanking was just teaching children that it's acceptable to hit when you're angry, and he wasn't going to do it anymore, and my first thought then was: "why did he wait until now, when I'm eight and too old to spank anyway, to figure that out?" I can see the rationale for a corrective light swat on a pre-reasoning bottom, but I think that, even if there weren't all the other reasons for not using corporal punishment on a fost/adopt, spanking a child over the age of reason is correction through humiliation, and that's a bad idea under any circumstances.<br /><br />When we talk about discipline, the thing that I keep in mind is that it isn't possible to really "control" a child. A teenager, especially, is going to hit a moment when it occurs to him that there's not really a lot their parents can do to them, and what they can do might be a small price to pay for whatever it is the teen wants to do (I remember clearly when I had that delicious revelation). Children are autonomous beings, and it's up to parents to guide them by building a relationship in which parents' guidance and opinions are valued (or at least complied with because it's such a <span style="font-style: italic;">hassle</span> otherwise...) And that works and it lasts - I still can't stand the idea of disappointing my dad. The important thing is to avoid overreaching the bounds of parental authority, because the inevitable result of that is that the parent either becomes a tyrant or a figure of ridicule or both.<br /><br />And we have theories, not children, and we'll probably laugh our asses off a year from now at these theories, but for right now, that's where we're coming from. Use a light touch, build the relationship, horse whisperer stuff.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Agent:</span> OK, but you understand that these kids might be 15 years old but emotionally aged 4, so they can't really make good decisions for themselves?</blockquote>And everything was like that. Except for the part when we told them that what we really wanted was a kid with ropy muscles, good for "working the farm." They asked about what experience we had with kids and one of the things we told them about was the open houses we did in 2003-2006. I was going back to school at VCU and we made dinner for whoever showed up one night a week. Told a few kids at school about it the first time, and they came, and then they told two people, and they told two people, and it went on like that. There was somebody every week who we'd never met before, and we still keep in touch with some of the regulars. Met their parents when the 'rents were in town. Good kids, for the most part. We enjoyed having them around.<br /><br />Still no firm news on the house situation. The house we'd like to buy has been re-listed at the same excessive price. We're getting close to the point where we're ready to make an offer, but we're not quite there yet.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-24778642803530977312009-04-09T00:28:00.002-04:002009-04-09T00:32:37.078-04:00Code CampIf you're going to be in Richmond, VA on April 25th, and you want to hear a highly technical (which is the nice way of saying mind meltingly boring) talk about designing Entity-Attribute-Value table structures and programming techniques to compensate for their performance shortcomings, I will be conducting exactly such a seminar at Richmond's Code Camp (too lazy to link) two weeks from this Saturday. Should be fun, and by fun, I mean woohoo! I can check off one of this year's work "stretch goals!"jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-66813024553560838392009-03-30T10:46:00.002-04:002009-03-30T12:53:49.615-04:00ContextThis is a fost/adopt blog. Really. In spite of the fact that the fost/adopt process is still in its nascence, and also in spite of the fact that I rarely blog. I thought I'd take a moment to give you an update on the whole shebang.<br /><br />We have turned in a great big pile of paperwork, but still have another great big pile, including our autobiographies, to go. We have a meeting with the agents on April 15, by which time we hope we can have the rest done. We're also hoping by then to have some more definite information about the house we want to buy. We aren't worried about anybody else grabbing it before we can get there - it's way out in the sticks, almost an hour from the edge of Richmond, the asking price is ludicrous (10% over assessment, no we're not going to pay anything remotely like that) and nobody but us has even come out to look at it since last May. It's new construction on 9.5 acres, still owned by the developers, and none of the other four much larger lots in the tract are so much as cleared. <br /><br />We're very excited about the house and we expect that sometime within the next six weeks we'll be ready to make an offer on it. We'd love to move sooner, but... see the problem is that we aren't people who like to live on credit - I haven't had a credit card since the first $500 limit teaser card I got my first week at college, and I cut that up before I graduated. In the nearly fifteen years B and I have been together, we have had... wait for it... zero credit cards and exactly one car loan and one student loan. That's it. Until the little Versa I'm driving now, we've bought used cars for cash. Except for the student loan and me putting my foot down when the '81 Toyota MR2 gave up the ghost on I-195 (in all fairness, we paid $2000 for that car and put 100,000 miles on it at over 30 mpg highway - it was a deal), if we don't have the money on hand, we don't spend it. Which means that our credit sucks because there's not much positive to report on it.<br /><br />So... six months ago when we decided that this is the year to buy a house, we not only went to work on that whole down payment thing, we also went to work on putting some positives in our credit history so that we could get a better rate on a mortgage. Since our lease isn't up until the end of July, it made sense to take our time. Sometime in April, early May at the latest, we should hit our goal number (we're 10 points away right now) and then we get the pre-approval, make an offer, seal the deal (refinance the car while we're at it) and get our move on. That's the plan. And I'm happy to report, it's on track.<br /><br />I'll let you know as soon as there's anything else to tell.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-53258802853462600022009-03-24T10:12:00.005-04:002009-03-24T12:36:19.513-04:00Security and PersonhoodWell this is just <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/24/us/24savana.html?hp">appalling</a>.<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>SAFFORD, Ariz. — Savana Redding still remembers the clothes she had on — black stretch pants with butterfly patches and a pink T-shirt — the day school officials here forced her to strip six years ago. She was 13 and in eighth grade.</p><p>An assistant principal, enforcing the school’s antidrug policies, suspected her of having brought prescription-strength ibuprofen pills to school. One of the pills is as strong as two Advils. </p><p>The search by two female school employees was methodical and humiliating, Ms. Redding said. After she had stripped to her underwear, “they asked me to pull out my bra and move it from side to side,” she said. “They made me open my legs and pull out my underwear.”</p>Ms. Redding, an honors student, had no pills. But she had a furious mother and a lawyer, and now her case has reached the <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/s/supreme_court/index.html?inline=nyt-org" title="More articles about the U.S. Supreme Court.">Supreme Court</a>, which will hear arguments on April 21.</blockquote>There's a lot of hyperbole from both mother and daughter in the article - the mom's lawyer calls this "the worst nightmare for any parent," Ms. Redding describes the incident as "ruin[ing] her life" but all the same, this is a clear case of a lack of respect for a kid's boundaries. And I find it worrisome.<br /><br />First of all, I find it worrisome because these kids won't always be kids. They'll be adults in a very short time, more to the point, they'll be voters, and the people who grew up in this drug war zero-tolerance atmosphere in schools will someday outnumber those of us who grew up in the good old days when the Fourth Amendment applied to everybody.<br /><br />Once we're out of school, most of us have limited contact with the same degree of intrusive authority that exists in the public school system, and for many people who do not have their dignity systematically threatened it is possible to believe that dignity is an earned state, not a contracted right. This is to say, unless we ourselves have had the misfortune to be the subjects of unjust intrusion into our personal effects, we tend to believe that such intrusions are generally justified and that if you aren't doing anything wrong, you have nothing to fear from the State.<br /><br />How much is this compounded when a person has learned to expect throughout their childhood not that an expectation of some privacy, a degree of respect by society for a boundary of the personal, is negotiable in certain specific circumstances where society has compelling reasons, but it <span style="font-style: italic;">does not exist at all</span>. Because certainly, if society can argue that the lack of a record of prior wrongdoing by a 13 year old girl is only proof that the girl hasn't been caught doing anything wrong, then we have entered the condition of the Paranoid State. If that same society allows a 13 year old girl to be strip searched without her parent's permission or even knowledge, in the pursuit of a dose of Advil, then we must conclude either that children's persons are violable by the state, or else that the notion of a "compelling social reason" has been redefined out of meaning. Is it any surprise, when our children grow up in an environment in which they have no rights the State is bound to respect, that they themselves have <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6888837/">no respect for the rights earlier generations considered inalienable</a>?<br /><br />I mention this here because when we talk about kids who have experienced trauma, we talk a lot about <span style="font-style: italic;">boundaries</span>. Children whose boundaries have been violated - either emotional or physical - cease to understand where lines are properly drawn. And so they may flash their private parts because they no longer understand that there is any such thing as a "private" part of themselves. Much of the work of a fost/adopt parent is to help the child re-learn where her appropriate boundaries are. And this is a challenge - how, for instance, do you deal with a child who has experienced sexual abuse and who now refuses to submit to medical examinations? He needs to receive proper health care, but he also needs to feel secure in his own body, and these needs are, for the moment, in conflict with each other.<br /><br />Medical attention is a case where the only way to administer it is to threaten a child's boundaries; schooling is not another such case. If we live in a country in which the we allow schools to neither recognize nor respect children's boundaries, perhaps our traumatized children are in the right after all. The world works the way they think it does, and we are hopelessly naive to think that a child can survive in it without taking off her clothes whenever and for whatever reason an adult tells her to.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-63102466152086316612009-03-23T19:25:00.003-04:002009-03-23T21:04:56.195-04:00SophomoriconWe have completed the eight hours of instruction required to become adoptive parents, which is eight hours more instruction than is required to become biological parents and approximately seven hundred ninety-two hours (give or take) less than is required to begin to have a clue about what we're getting ourselves into. I've tried to fill the gaps by reading everything I can find, both in print and in self-publication, i.e. blogs. And for the record, here's what I've learned:<br /><br /><ul><li>Child raising is like CPR, in that new information is always forthcoming and periodically the new information is revolutionary. There's a cycle of throwing out theories as new theories emerge. That doesn't mean that all theories are bunk and you can just ignore them, but do be ready to accept new ideas. Just because last year they taught you mouth to mouth and this year they say no mouth to mouth and hum the BeeGees while you do compressions doesn't mean that this year, if you see someone in cardiac arrest that you shouldn't do anything because next year they'll find another song that's even better.<br /></li><li>The behavior is what will present itself, but knocking out a behavior without getting at the underlying cause will only cause a new behavior to spring up in its place. If the underlying cause is unknown, fear is a safe first guess. In other words, Fear is the Kudzu of parenting traumatized children.<br /></li><li>Getting involved with fost/adopt is checking into the biggest morass of second guessing I've ever come into contact with. There is no end to criticism of the system and everyone who is a part of it, which in every case should either have let kids be with parents who were good or removed them much earlier from the bad ones, but in no cases ever acted exactly as soon as anybody ought to have noticed that something was wrong and not a day before. Somebody always ought to have known what Anybody else thought would have been best for Everybody, if only they all hadn't been so selfish/lazy/stupid/only in it for the money. The motives of all voluntary parents of suffering children are automatically either laudable, suspect, or both and they should all be considered guilty of not doing enough for their children until they prove themselves innocent by collapsing from nervous exhaustion.<br /></li><li>Sometimes kids wet the bed as a response to a specific, temporary anxiety. And sometimes they do it because their abusers didn't want to rape a kid who smelled bad. The fact that they continue to wet themselves when they're safe with you doesn't mean that they don't feel safe with you, necessarily. It's because that's the way the world works for them. Even if you're safe, that doesn't mean the world is. This cross applies to basically everything.</li><li>There is a different right answer for every child, and the only people who don't know what that right answer is are the people providing day to day care for him. It is strange that this should be so, but as the world in general tends to be in agreement on this point in each individual case (although the pattern is generally denied) anyone taking the part of a parent in any particular accusation is taking what is popularly considered to be an indefensible position.<br /></li><li>When a child is neglected, a caustic chemical is released in her brain that has a calming effect on that child. If the neglect happens too frequently and the chemical is released too often, the brain resets its "rage thermostat" so that the chemical will now only be released under more extreme circumstances, leaving the kids with the most to cope with a harder time coping with everything. If one assumes the existence of an Omnipotent Diety, this single fact must be proof of Its satirical nature.</li></ul>The agency has informed us that a case worker will contact us on Wednesday to begin our home study process. We still have a house to buy before the study can be completed.<br /><br />My heartfelt good wishes for Torina. More than anything else, these poor waiting children need people like Torina's (and Yondalla's and the Grateful House and RADical Adventures) prominent presence in our society, because she provides visibility for their situation and encouragement and inspiration for people who are considering taking on the challenge of reforming their family to include a parentless special needs child. It is a shame that any dyspeptic troll can drive one of these bloggers underground by threatening to make false and baseless accusations of abuse against them. Taking her blog private was the only prudent thing Torina could do, but future adoptive parents will be poorer for not having her example to learn from, both in her successes and in her setbacks.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-78431191088537815262009-03-12T16:41:00.002-04:002009-03-12T16:49:57.491-04:00About that "i" in "Gullible"Doop de doop de doo, what's up on Facebook today? (Answer: links to more information than I wanted to know about the sex life of a guy I knew in college, that's up.)<br /><br />But what is this? There, across the top - it appears that 2 of my facebook friends have challenged me to an IQ test! And 1 of my friends - somebody in Glen Allen - thinks I'm dumb! Which is weird because I didn't know any of my friends lived in Glen Allen, although it would be cool if they did because that's where I work and it would be so close by and we should totally get a drink sometime or something. Just as soon as I take this IQ test and show them who's dumb!<br /><br />Clicky clicky and this is a 10 question IQ test. WOW the questions are so easy! And there's my cell phone number and yes I accept the terms and conditions and...<br /><br />It dawns on me that my IQ definitely has been tested here.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://failblog.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/fail-owned-bike-lock-owner-fail.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 375px; height: 500px;" src="http://failblog.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/fail-owned-bike-lock-owner-fail.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>On the phone canceling my new subscription now...jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-64154514492444247382009-03-02T22:04:00.005-05:002009-03-03T17:21:49.480-05:00Snow DayThe 'net was flaky today, as was the power. Last night at 10, as we were taking the doggus for her walk, there was a kind of a zzzttt and a kind of a bright blue light, and a kind of a POW and then there was a kind of a dark all the way down the street. Across the street they had power. This happened after the hurricane too - the other side of the street had their power reconnected the next day, but our side of the street was up for an hour, then zzzt-blue-POW! and it was down for a week. That wasn't quite as bad because it was spring, so the lack of a working heater wasn't such a dire prospect. Last night, we missed the heat.<br /><br />Went to see <span style="font-style: italic;">The Reader</span> on Friday. Lot of skin. I enjoyed it, enough to pick up the book right after we got out of the movie. Read it Friday night. The book is much more clearly about the generational struggle in post-nazi Germany, and the tension created when the post-war generation's obligation to condemn the actions of their parents comes into conflict with a realization of the older generation's pitiable limitations. The movie was more a character study - interesting, but only as a character study. I found the book meatier. Speaking of meatier, the movie is much steamier than the book, so if you're looking for something with Kate Winslet and David Kross nude, lots, and from many angles, but on paper, Felicia Day reviews some <a href="http://feliciaday.com/blog/highland-hunk-fantasy">Highland Hunk Fantasies</a> that might interest you.<br /><br />Watching all that skin, had to wonder how much longer we'll be able to go see intelligent movies that have a non-neurotic, not-cartoonish sexual aspect and have to stick to the flicks that eschew sensuality and concentrate more on shooting, car chases, and the "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-wj-vuNm88">Gimme some sugar, baby</a>" theory on relationships. I could do without the sex scenes entirely, as long as the movies are smart, but those are even harder to find. <span style="font-style: italic;">Waitress</span> was smart without being pr0n, but that's just one movie and Adrienne Shelley isn't around to make more of them. Woody Allen writes about relationships without focusing on the sex, but B hates Woody Allen who really peaked with <span style="font-style: italic;">Hannah and Her Sisters</span> anyway, so what's the point?<br /><br />The next fost/adopt class is on March 11, at which time we're going to have to ask for fresh copies of the application paperwork - many thanks to the cat who saw a half-full glass of orange juice sitting on the desk beside the paperwork and said <span style="font-style: italic;">This Will Not Stand</span>. Mostly I'm not worried, but there is a tiny bit of me that frets over having to admit... that I can't train a cat. A cat who is remarkably stupid, by the way. A cat who makes it so we can't have a resevoir waterer for the pets because she will sit at it, by the hour, scooping water out of the bowl with her paw, marveling at the way the water goes out and more water comes in! She'll sit in a quart-sized puddle of water, still amazed at the way the water keeps coming and sometimes <span style="font-style: italic;">there are bubbles in the tank!</span> And I can't train her! So who would let me have a kid if I can't even teach a stupid cat not to do whatever she wants? Also, I can't bend space and time. Disgraceful.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-9242795412420456882009-02-22T21:15:00.005-05:002009-02-22T22:13:13.186-05:00What I Did This WeekendFuture SIL Amy, her mom Judy and I went to the Maymont Flower and Garden Show and Home Show. The menfolk are very resistant to the Garden Show. There was much mocking and there was limited patience when we met back up in the afternoon to hearing about the show. We didn't even get the chance to tell them about vendors like this one:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrewbain/2286019777/"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 375px;" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3055/2286019777_8d7821e6f0.jpg?v=1203818219" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />They even sell <a href="http://www.nevillsflowers.com/montoursville-flowers/t-shirt-161377p.asp?rcid=16479&point=1">t-shirts!</a><br /><br />My big find at the show: Heuchera, and that <a href="http://www.sandysplants.com/search.cfm?StartRow=1&x_search=heuchera&x_datafield=All">Sandy's Plants</a> in Mechanicsville carries lots of varieties.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-66368388208635336572009-02-17T13:10:00.005-05:002009-02-17T13:56:05.525-05:00Cool (Earth) Stuff<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.terrapass.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/strip.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 156px; height: 200px;" src="http://www.terrapass.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/strip.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Completely OT, but neat. This <a href="http://www.terrapass.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Store_Code=TerraPass&Screen=PROD&Product_Code=SP-0008001-A">Smart Strip</a> power strip has seven outlets - one "control" outlet that is always powered, two red outlets that are always powered, and four outlets that power up and down depending on the power draw on the blue control outlet. In simpler speak, if you plug your TV or computer into the blue outlet and plug all the peripherals (printers, dvd player, etc) into the white outlets, whenever you turn your TV off or let your computer go to sleep, the Smart Strip will detect the decrease in power to the blue plug and turn all your peripherals off. When you turn the TV or computer back on, it turns all your peripherals on, too. Plus, there are two non-control always powered plugs, so the same strip works for the cable box with the router plugged into it that you want left on all the time. Nifty, huh?<br /><br />TerraPass has a lot of cool stuff, like <a href="http://www.terrapass.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Store_Code=TerraPass&Screen=PROD&Product_Code=1-MI-000700">chocolate that comes with carbon offsets</a>, and a <a href="http://www.terrapass.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=EV-RDRNNR&Store_Code=TerraPass">Roadrunner showerhead</a> that is a high pressure low-flow shower which detects when the water temp hits 95 degrees and then automatically shuts it down to a trickle until you pull a cord (then the water is on until you turn off the tap, at which time it resets itself). The upside of this is that you can turn the shower on in the morning to heat up without sending hot water down the drain with nobody around to enjoy it, and the low-flow means that the hot water lasts longer while you're in the shower. I swear, if this thing had been around when I was a teenager, my dad would have been a much, <span style="font-style: italic;">much</span> happier man.<br /><br />Update: <a href="http://www.terrapass.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=ST-0001003-A&Store_Code=TerraPass">Solar/USB/AC powered charger</a>, <span style="font-style: italic;">with built-in carabiner</span>. Just sit it in the sun (or plug it into either a wall or a computer's USB port) and you can charge your cell phone, digital camera, etc. with it. I don't know why the carabiner makes it so much more exciting, but it does. This is just one of those moments when I realize I have an REI soul trapped in a Lane Bryant body. Le sigh.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-27609676386076394052009-02-16T10:44:00.002-05:002009-02-16T11:06:36.611-05:00Homeless Rates IncreasingVia <a href="http://examinedlife.typepad.com/johnbelle/2009/02/houses-homes.html">John & Belle Have A Blog</a>, this article in the WaPo on <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/15/AR2009021501966_pf.html">homeless families</a> has some bad news for Virginia's kids:<br /><blockquote>A study to be released tomorrow by the Richmond-based research groups Commonwealth Institute and Voices for Virginia's Children concludes that if the national unemployment rate reaches 9 percent by the fall, as many as 218,000 Virginians might drop below the poverty line, including 73,000 children. A similar analysis by the Maryland Budget and Tax Policy Institute estimated that Maryland could see as many as 189,000 people slip below the poverty line.</blockquote>It's probably the same in your states. I'm just guessing here, but rising numbers of families and kids falling into poverty sounds to me like a scenario for rising numbers of kids showing up in foster care. The bitter cup runneth over.<br /><br />Please do read the WaPo article - it profiles a family, two parents, two kids, they were making about $60,000/year. Parents both get hit with job cuts and... whoosh. It's all gone.<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>For nearly a generation, the face of homelessness in America has been that of a man or woman living on the street and panhandling for loose change. But with the foreclosure crisis, stagnant economy and rising unemployment, advocates for the homeless said they are seeing more two-parent families seeking shelter.</p><p>Many of the newly homeless are <span style="font-style: italic;">renters whose landlords were foreclosed on</span>, members of families in which a parent lost a job or low-wage workers who were living on the edge even before losing their jobs.</p><p>Experts who study homelessness and poverty said the increase in homeless families illustrates how severely the economic crisis is affecting middle- and working-class households and how the worsening economy is pushing more people toward poverty.</p></blockquote><br />I'm struck more and more by the renter's dilemma. There's potential deflation in the housing market on the horizon, so buying right now - even if you can - is a considerably risky business. It might seem safer to stick with renting because it's easier to downsize, if that's what you have to do, and because you don't want to join the ranks of people whose mortgages are for more than the homes are worth now. But even if you rent and even if you keep your job and even if you make your payments, you could come home and find your stuff on the sidewalk if your landlord doesn't pay his bills. There should be some protection for renters whose landlords default, but there isn't.<br /><br />Anyway, if you came here through some means other than fost/adopt, if there's room in your home and your life for a kid whose parents are good people but caught up in economic craziness, there are most likely going to be lots of kids who could use your help in the coming couple of years. If it's something that you just never thought about doing, now would be a good time to give it a think or two.jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-84998417421431955512009-02-15T19:28:00.002-05:002009-02-15T19:45:25.616-05:00Looking for InfoI'm trying to find information on the education needs, up to and including home schooling, that my future Annie/Oliver might have. Unfortunately, googling "homeschool" and its variants so far has turned up all manner of "home school your children to keep the scary fact-based world out and bind the kids to you 4EVAR!!!" advice that does put the fear of God into me, but not in the way the authors intended.<br /><br />Can any of the sane, rational people who read this make any recommendations? I'm looking specifically for info that would give me an insight into children ages 12&up, and children with cognitive delay.<br /><br />Also, question for the day, why is it that people who do international adoptions aren't required to learn any of the language their children speak? I'm not wondering why folks aren't becoming fluent in Mandarin Chinese (although there is a "Teach Yourself" series B and I saw at the bookstore that included "Teach Yourself Mandarin Chinese in 14 Days." We'd been about to purchase that company's German kit until we saw the Chinese one and decided that the company might have a tendency to overpromise.)jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2083881342231982295.post-67001181800574276212009-02-15T12:58:00.007-05:002009-02-15T19:28:32.335-05:00I enjoy being a nerd.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://motivatedphotos.com/?id=8060"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 256px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV_DL5mlxJConTe_oaQlooqrEp7lIVRXNhViFEgbfsEVhCMO_3LCio7C_NRxK_FTkZyZx2vdP69uWbqKQUqs4s4R3qPhr_LEAcqq9Qlzh9HMsfTb54B833MA34NY2e0O_ttIFsz7jgcgs/s320/calculus.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5303097622671843506" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Had a lovely Valentines Day, now B is watching the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer in one room and I've got Firefly on DVD in the other, so we're on a happy Joss Whedon kick here. I should be doing work stuff right now (I was sick this week and want to stay on track), but I just found this <a href="http://xkcd.com/">webcomic</a>...<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/schrodinger.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 700px; height: 217px;" src="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/schrodinger.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/schrodinger.jpg"><br /></a>jenniebeehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16835396908376825004noreply@blogger.com0