Hmm. I don't have much to add to the cat problem, but I can forsee that this might happen when my kitty grows up. I just changed to crystal cat littler, and he does not like how it feels on his feet, so he sort of perches on the edge of the box to pee. It is perhaps more amusing than it should be.

Regarding parenting/education issues-- I have no idea if this is something she made up, but my old boss was on a tour of our University with prospective students and their parents, and one of the parents asked "who will wake my son up in the morning?" and was upset when the she was told that getting himself up and going to class was his responsibility now.

My mother, on the other hand was REALLY hands off about school, probably to a weird extreme. She would never, for example, have read over my essay like Laura did, because in her brain, that was cheating. Luckily, I never wrote anything innappropraite. I don't think she ever once checked to see if I did my homework or anything, or helped me with any projects or anything. Of course, we didn't really get homework until 3rd grade, and didn't have any take home type projects (map-making, family trees) until 5th or 6th, so I was old enough to do it on my own.

one of the parents asked "who will wake my son up in the morning?" and was upset when the she was told that getting himself up and going to class was his responsibility now.

Good heavens. I was getting myself up for school from 4th or 5th grade on.

It probably helps that I'm naturally a morning person. But, by the time I was in high school, if I'd suggested to my mom that she make sure I got up in time for school she would have laughed herself into a hernia. And then grounded my ass if I'd overslept and missed any school time.

With my teenagers, they are on their own in the mornings, I'm in the office before they wake up. Neither has been tardy yet.

Shoot, even CJ (3rd grade), gets up, gets dressed, makes his lunch, and has breakfast with very little proding. When DH is working, CJ has the teenagers there to keep him on task, but they pretty much ignore him. My mom is upstairs through most of this but she makes sure he gets out the door to school on time (a short two block walk, no streets to cross).

Cheerios

Oh, and we just got quarter grades for both the girls. They both got 3.143 GPA's. C's best grades yet and K-Bugs worst, but with the heavy load she has, we are not complaining about much. The C+ in PE is an issue, but her teacher has already admitted he "goofed".

Since I missed this last night...

Didn't David Letterman give a scholarship for a "C" student at his alma mater? (Ball State, I think?)

meara, David Letterman DID go to Ball State and did sponsor a scholarship for C students--but it was just for media broadcasting majors.

Thanks for suggestions and support. I am feeling a bit more rational about the topic - rational enough to realize that I need at least one full night's sleep before spending any more energy trying to figure out what I need to do.

Re: getting oneself up for school in the morning - by the time I was in 6th grade, I was not only getting myself up for school in the morning, but also making sure both my mother and brother were not hitting the snooze button too many times, mostly because I wasn't crazy about their choices of radio stations for their clock radios (why does "radios" not look right? radeos? err, my brain, she hurts).

I've had a number of roomates in the past who had a hard time waking - for at least one it was a metabolic problem. She was one of those itty bitty little skinny women whose bodies would begin to consume itself if she went too long without eating. Once in a while I would sense that she was having more than the usual amount of trouble waking, so I'd bring her a glass of orange juice. It seemed to provide the sugar fuel she needed to get up.

The nice thing about college is if you don't want to wake yourself up in the morning, there are usually ways to avoid having early morning classes. I think I had 1 class that started before 11 in my entire 4 years.

Saw a show on Goblet of Fire last night. They focused on Our Heroes, of course, but the guy who plays Lucius (I should leave it Lucious, as I always type it first) obviously enjoys the heck out of his life. Roughly, "When I put all this on, especially when I pick up that snake-headed cane, I become delightfully nasty."

My conversation last night: "Where's Draco? Damn, Radcliffe's a hottie. Come on, show me Dra--oh my god. Look at Draco. Bibble."

edit: Plus the grown-ups were being all amused at how the kids are growing up. The guy who plays Hagrid was talking about how the guys are noticing the girls and "trying to be cool and leaning against things the way I haven't been able to do in thirty years."

Thankful that my cat prefers the great outdoors and only uses the box when weather is nasty.

Bobby(11) uses his alarm and gets up on his own. Brendon at 13 would sleep through alarms, squirt guns, etc. It takes me 4-5 tries before he stirs. I'm hoping this is a stage because he used to be the early bird.

Before I get busy, 2 delightful random beautiful things that have helped my week.

1) The teens and pre-teens developed the habit of playing ball in the park when they were without power for a couple weeks. That was nice, but even nicer stuff follows. The power crews from various states were using my park for parking their trucks and taking breaks. I looked out the window and watched as this group of grown men that had left their homes and families to come down and fix our power lines were playing ball with our kids. Some scrambling and kicking soccer ball while others were helping the kids perfect their football throwing skills.

2) The hurricane stripped many trees bare. It was an ugly debris strewn bleak world for a bit there. Then nature pleasantly surprised me. The bare trees sprouted buds and are now covered with tiny spring green leaves. This is so odd in November. The broken limbs still hang in the trees with their remaining leaves withered, but they lay in the midst of new foliage. It's my favorite green that spring leaf green.

ION, I went out with my coworkers last night to celebrate the Beaujolais Nouveau, and today I have a headache and for some reason I'm at work anyway. What's up with that?