Oh, my piece of excitement over the weekend: while on the way to meet friends at a playground (two other Chinese-Austtralian couples, apparently we joined a club while I wasn't watching), we got a flat tyre. In the car were Wallybee, Ryan and Waipo (grandma), who all got to stand around and watch me change it (with the added fun of dampening Ryan's eagerness to help). Wallybee was very impressed, she wasn't aware that we had a spare, or for that matter that I knew how to change one. (I'm not quite sure whether to be flattered or offended on that point.)

Vituperative VENT ahead:

My husband's ex want us to move to PA because M misses his dad. OK, I get that. I really do. Of course he missed his dad. Of course it would be wonderful if they could be together more.

But she's applying pressure, says M is having self-esteem issues (which, frankly, I see as something coming NOT from missing dad) and that M is expressing that Dad isn't moving to PA because of me.

Aside from that fact that even if D and I split tomorrow, it's ridiculous. This woman has lived in three cities, 3 states in 4 years, M has changed from a crappy public school to a competitive private school, has been an only child for 8 years and has a 1 year old baby brother, and bio mom and bio dad both got new spouses in the last year.

She has a new job that has her out of the house all the time, a new baby and...I'm not moving. Aside from the fact that D has a steady job he likes and has been at for 7 years, his family is in Iowa, we have a house that we are slowly digging out of the financial mess SHE left behind when she moved two states away following the lover she had an adulterous affair with...I'm not moving.

I don't want to, it would be HORRIBLE for me, I would be terribly unhappy, our marriage would suffer and I would resent M for it. It would be a disaster, and it's not going to happen.

GRR. Woman, sometimes I fucking hate you. When you pack up and leave shit behind, you leave a trail of disaster and chaos. We want to be stable, I want to be HERE, with my elderly parents, my close-knit circle of friends that's 20 years old and we are just going to have to make the best of the life choices YOU made.

YOU fucked around. YOU left the marriage. YOU followed your lover to MN. YOU followed him to PA when he got a job. YOU took a stressful job. YOU had a baby. Ok. People have the right to make choices that would make them happy. But you don't think. And you were towing a 4 year old along in your irresponsible wake. And now there is a "hole in his life." Of course there is. And your choices lead to this.

We are not moving, and it's cruel of you to keeping putting in into your son's head.

D doesn't want to move either. I flatly will not. I will compromise on many, many things, but I won't on this. Anyway, with her peripatetic past, there's no guarantee they wouldn't up and leave anyway.

I am suggesting to D that several things happen. (1) We make it clear moving is NOT on the table, and she needs to not bring it up to M as a possibility. You moved away. Your choice. D could have not let you, according to KS child agreement laws, so suck it the fuck it.

It would be optimal if D were closer to M. Of course. Life? Not optimal. Not fair. Not perfect. And sometimes you just have to do the best with what is in existence. We can work on visiting more, work on getting M out here more. Money is an issue (mostly because you completely fucked everything to shit for D, and I am not exaggerating -- a business she left behind abruptly when she moved, abandoning the house after she told D to move out so she could live her with her lover, leaving behind years of unpaid mortage, utility and doctor bills.)

(2) M needs to go to a therapist, someone who isn't mom or dad, or stepmom or stepdad, someone who is objective and who he doesn't feel like he needs to hide emotionally hurtful feelings about. Now. I think he should have been in therapy for a little while, because of all the chaos and changes going on in his life. I will be researching area therapists. If she doesn't agree, then we will contact the mediator, and make it happen. She's done this, for stupid shit like requiring M be enrolled in summer camps when he's here on summer vaca with dad.

(3) All conversations of this nature will be now done on Skype or speakerphone, since her husband is in on all calls of this nature to D. You have been selfish and hauled your kid around, following any whim you felt at the moment and you want to make D feel like a bad dad? The man who cries because he missed his child, he man who calls and (continued...)

( continues...) Skypes hom three times a week, the man who spends every hour M is here involved and active with him, the man who gets $600 in child support automatically deducted from his account each month, the man who was left behind without his son to clean up all the financial messes you left behind?

Bitch, fear me. You may have been able to emotionally manipulate D in the past -- he's a fairly passive person, and you emotionally abused him and belittled him and used him; he's got some responsibility for not standing up for himself more, but she beat hom down for YEARS -- but you are not just dealing with him now, and you try this fuckwaddery with me to back him up, and I will fucking cut you.

No child's life is optimal,you can just do your best to make it as good as possible WITHIN REASON and your shitty choices are impacting your son, and you want US to uproot and move so that D can be a "better dad?" Insane trolls are more logical.

Fuck that noise. Bring it. Bring it the fuck on.

I will papertrail and polite-talk and CC and assertive and legal my way into making the best possible decisions for M and for D and I will do it in such a bloodless and perfect way that you won't know what has hit you. And there won't be a single thing you can do about it, because it will be ruthlessly logical, therapeutically and legally sound and you will look like the crazy, selfish bitch you are.

GRRRRRRRRR.

Ok, this just happened, and I was all logical and supportive and we will work this out, but I had to get my RAGE on for a few minutes. I am a pretty-laid back and rational person, but do not fuck with the people I love.

You really, really don't want to do that. I will use everything in my power, and when my anger is finally ignited, empires shake and kings tremble. Usually I can't be arsed. But if I have to, I will bring everything I have to bear on it. And hon, I DON'T LIKE YOU. I will fuck your world UP.

I will papertrail and polite-talk and CC and assertive and legal my way into making the best possible decisions for M and for D and I will do it in such a bloodless and perfect way that you won't know what has hit you. And there won't be a single thing you can do about it, because it will be ruthlessly logical, therapeutically and legally sound and you will look like the crazy, selfish bitch you are.

Now I'm afraid of you E.

This sounds like a perfect strategy and I applaud you for it.

Erin, that was a brilliant rant. I hope it was really good at letting off some steam in this safe place so you could deal with the people involved with the "ruthlessly logical, therapeutically and legally sound" tactics that make up your excellent plan.

"Why would we move to Pennsylvania? You'd just move again."

Did he let her out of the agreement to stay local or just not file a suit? Man, I'd threaten that bitch with a suit hourly.

Of course, I have a temper.

That was a most excellent rant and I believe you plan is a good one.

I will papertrail and polite-talk and CC and assertive and legal my way into making the best possible decisions for M and for D and I will do it in such a bloodless and perfect way that you won't know what has hit you. And there won't be a single thing you can do about it, because it will be ruthlessly logical, therapeutically and legally sound and you will look like the crazy, selfish bitch you are.

This is why I love my fellow Virgos so very much. And why I love Erin so very much.

Bring the righteous Virgo rage on, baby, for it is mighty and fierce so fucking coldly efficient.

A genius rant indeed.

Yes!!! Erin rules.