Working in a call center for a company that does plumbing parts for RV's. They recently acquired a new branch or something and the call volume went up. Joe's job is to help them assess if they need a full time person which he will absolutely make sure they need.

Yay for jobs! That's fab!

So, can my unemployed boy have some -ma now?

Woohoo, Joe!

Yay for Joe!

I think I just severed all ties with my sister and her family. I had written back to her asking if they could shorten their visit, or failing that, I sent a list of inexpensive nearby hotels.

In response I got this whole huge guilt trip about how her husband is overcoming his fear of flying to come out (he only planned to stay 5 days) and how he'll be so hurt and offended. In between the obvious manipulation, it appears that the real goals of their trip were 1) meet their son's fiancee's parents, which he's trying to avoid until the wedding; and 2) dump their freeloading daughter and her baby on us.

It occurred to me that this is one of those relationships that takes up a lot of time and effort without doing anything positive for my life, and in fact brings a lot of negative. So I just wrote and told her that they were uninvited and unwelcome here.

Her bad luck she caught me during PMS week.

ION, Mal, still following in Owen's footsteps, went walkabout just now. I had to pick him up from daycare (pinkeye) and when we got home I ran to the bathroom. While I was there, he opened the front door and left. The gardeners intercepted him over a block away. Today was the first day I haven't throw the deadbolt to prevent this, so I guess I should be glad for the reminder with no really horrible repercussions.

I had written back to her asking if they could shorten their visit, or failing that, I sent a list of inexpensive nearby hotels.

See, any reasonable person would find nothing wrong with that.

In response I got this whole huge guilt trip about how her husband is overcoming his fear of flying to come out (he only planned to stay 5 days) and how he'll be so hurt and offended.

And this is *your* problem, how?

In between the obvious manipulation, it appears that the real goals of their trip were 1) meet their son's fiancee's parents, which he's trying to avoid until the wedding; and 2) dump their freeloading daughter and her baby on us.

Well, NOW I understand the being hurt and offended -- they're offended that they lost free room, board, and babysitting service.

It occurred to me that this is one of those relationships that takes up a lot of time and effort without doing anything positive for my life, and in fact brings a lot of negative. So I just wrote and told her that they were uninvited and unwelcome here.

Good for you. Seriously.

I don't understand how someone can be offended by that after inviting themselves somewhere. You would think they had no concept of offence to begin with.

Ouch, Raq. Good on you for putting your foot down.

Way to go, Joe!

So sorry about your sister Raq. I know how it feels to have not entirely loving feelings for a sister.

Job~ma for Jars' boy.

Raq it sucks you have to deal with that. Mom had to come to that same conclusion about her sister W, when she realised that W was not going to come visit her (unless she needed to evacute) and the only time W asked Mom to go see her was when stuff needed to be done - like wallpapering. Mom does occasionally feel guilty about not being closer to her sister, but her life is much more enjoyable without regular guilt trips.

I had written back to her asking if they could shorten their visit, or failing that, I sent a list of inexpensive nearby hotels.

I agree with Steph. It might cause me to scramble, if my sister with her two small children asked me that, and rearrange, but it's her prerogative to do so, especially if the length of the visit exceeded 2-3 nights. I'd definitely WANT to know if my being there would be a hardship in any way and be willing to rearrange to help her out.

However, since we are actually the de facto babysitters for her kids when we go out there, we don't run into the same issues, I think.

Ooh! I'm going to see my sister next weekend! (crossing fingers that Skybus works out better for us this time)