Thanks, MFN! I hadn't thought of keeping long-standing accounts open. The rates are all too astronomical to feel good about using, even as emergency "Winifred the Echo is sick" cards, but maybe it's worth not closing them all, at least right away. I'll throw them in the freezer until it's decision making time.

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Maybe the slacker mom article will be more my style. I couldn't get through the first one, because I was too busy rolling my eyes at the perfectionism.

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Timelies. I just got back from driving a coworker to the emergency room where her husband was taken with nausea and cold sweats. I hope it's the flu and not a heart attack. They both take transit and the hospital isn't transit accessible.

Congratulations, PC! on the letter from the physicist. Your parents will enjoy reading it, I'll bet.

More on credit scoring from THE credit scoring company: [link]

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Maybe the slacker mom article will be more my style. I couldn't get through the first one, because I was too busy rolling my eyes at the perfectionism.

Huh. I thought the article was very anti-perfectionism. But in a way that made me realize it's not just me putting pressure on myself, it's the whole current Culture of Motherhood.

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Huh. Who knew I was a slacker mom? Well, I did. But I figured it was more important that they did stuff with me than that I took them to somebody who did stuff with them professionally. I mean, laying out on the grass in the backyard with a couple of magnifying glass and making up stories about the ants we were watching was a whole lot more fun for them and for me, than a guided tour of the natural science center, with a quiz after. We did the NSC, too, and the Planetarium, but it was much more relaxed and less programmed.

I had acres of free time when I was growing up. I wanted as much of that for my kids as I could give them. Given, of course, that idle hands get into mischief, and they needed at least modest supervision. They got motivated on their own soon enough, and joined things. But it was their choice, not mine or DH's.

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Right now when my son Leif sees an ant in the backyard he'll start yelling 'Hi Ant!', 'Hi Ant!'.

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Huh. I thought the article was very anti-perfectionism.

I mean the woman who was talking about how she used to put in three hours of high intensity quality parenting before work, and another three after. I knew it was going where you say, but I couldn't read about all the now former-or-dead perfectionists, to get there.

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I miss the days when my mother would look at me, open the back door and say, "Shoo, you've been in the house too long." Granted, I lived in the country, but I knew lots of town kids who would just wander around and observe the world and have adventures in vacant lots.

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First article was scary. I"m trying to figure otu if I'm gonna work or stay home once the sprog is sprogged, and that story made both possibilities sound terrifying.

Second one sounded pretty similar to how I was raised, though I did get driven to soccer practices and piano lessons. We certainly played in the mud in the backyard often enough.

Health~ma for Java's co-worker.

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As of this morning, we can finally see some bare patches in our still fairly snowy backyard. I can't wait for the first day I can just shoo them out, connie.

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