It’s Friday, and THANK GOD it’s Friday, because it means I can direct you elsewhere. And some Fridays I think, “This is kind of a cop-out, writing about what I ate this week or how much I hate my elliptical or how many closets I’ve cleaned, because nobody cares about that,” but this Friday is different.
This Friday, the alternative to directing you to my scintillating Five Full Plates post about switching to cloth napkins and such is to relive the horror of Monkey’s retelling of the “you and your body” talks they’ve been having at school this week, or to share the “anti-drug education” that’s happening at the middle school at the same time.
[Hint: “Someone asked if you can have sex with a doorknob. I’M NOT KIDDING.” Another hint: “Someone on the bus had something that looked like dried grass rolled up in a little tube of white paper. Why is that?” It’s almost like public school is just daring me now, I swear.]
So. Napkins! Napkins are nice and boring. And don’t make my head explode. Hooray!
As much as I believe that free universal education is essential to the survival of a democratic society, for what it’s worth, you have my vote for home schooling. (That and a buck and a quarter will get you cold drink from the vending machine.)
Aaaaaaaaacccckkkkk! I may not let my children graduate from elementary school. What, they have “gifted” programs, they can do calculus in their 4th grade classroom when they are 17.
*shudder* I loathe the thought of middle/high school.
As always, I read your five full plates post.
Your life is far to exciting.
You should go on a cruise or something.
I’m filing a formal complaint about my daughter’s teacher this year (she’s only in 2nd grade)which I hate to do but needs to be done. They may not let me back next year. lol I don’t even want to *think* about upper elementary and middle school. Hope next week is less “eventful” for you.
Aaaaand I’m on the other end where my children are kindly explaining terminology to me. This week’s new phrase? “Hot Box.” Yerg. This parenting thing is not for the faint of heart.
I,for one, want to hear all about Monkey’s “education” about sex and drugs and (do they teach about rock’n’roll?)
How flexible should somebody be in order to have sex with a doorknob? Can’t. Even. Imagine.
One time, when a bunch of us were helping a friend move, we were trying to get the dryer down into the basement, and one of the guys was trying to back and fill the dryer around to the basement stairs and got caught between the dryer and the closet door…he said the doorknob was getting WAAAAY too friendly! He was a relatively tall guy, so I can see it happening.
I had to go look up “hot box”…
I’m with you on the cloth napkins. I use a dishtowel as my napkin for basically all week. But when we have company, which has been once a week here lately, we use bandannas. And yes, you read that right, bandannas. They make the cutest napkins ever and cost maybe 50 cents a piece. And I always get complimented on how cute they are. Oh, and LOVE your napkin rings (from an earlier post).
Also, I think that your dad has a pretty good idea!
I highly recommend you read this post. Here’s an excerpt: “If you are a parent who thinks you could never homeschool, be encouraged: I used to be one of you. If someone had suggested back then that I should homeschool, I would have had a dozen reasons ready why I could not do it. One day, I ran out of reasons. Actually, the reasons why I wanted to try homeschooling began to outnumber my excuses for not trying it….It became obvious that the government’s public school system was failing both of my children, and I finally took a serious look at homeschooling. Our lives (and their education) changed completely within the next few months, and it has been a change that we have never regretted. If you think you could never homeschool, be sure that you are not avoiding homeschooling for mere excuses.”
um, Liz? Who said the doorknob was still on the door?
I know ewwww! I couldn’t help it.
And I too vote for the post about Sex, Drugs & Rock & Roll via Monkey & Chickie’s publik skool ed-U-K-A-shuns! ;-)
I went to publik skool & I turned out FINE!
Oh thank goodness, “hot box” was nowhere near as disturbing as I was worried it was going to be.
I’m finding this part of parenting unexpectedly uncomfortable. I like to think of myself as a sex-positive, Dan-Savage-listening, thoroughly comfortable modern woman, and then when I go to discuss things with my older child (or, worse, try to deal with the implications of him needing this knowledge someday) I unexpectedly turn into my mother, who dealt with the whole thing by handing me a couple of books and telling me to figure it out.
Hmm. Come to think of it, maybe my mother wasn’t as prudish as I thought she was. Maybe she only was with *me*.
Sex education can always be an embarrassing situation. And lead to some interesting questions! If you look in the archives of my site, you can find the story of how I learned about the birds and the bees, I asked what a prostitute was (what? I heard my mom use the word!) and then proceeded to ask about cheez puffs. Mom had/has a way of giving waaaaaay too much information!
There isn’t a mom alive who would turn away “boring.” Boring is INDEED good!!