this one sweet oldster (13!) that looked like Pumpkin and Loki mated who had been given up because he didn't like the new kitten

OMG evil people. Wonder how the wife will feel when her husband gets a new kitten?

Matt, can you get Dustbunny inside yet? Don't wait, okay? He might disappear.

Percy is the only one of mine who deliberately knocks stuff off, and he's polite about it. He hasn't knocked off anything that's displayed and stays in one place, only random stuff like pill bottles. Sometimes I leave bottle caps on his favorite sitting place for him to knock off. I think they just like to watch stuff fall.

The thing is, those high-achieveing low-income kids who do get into Harvard have a hard row to hoe even if they get a full ride. They are often underprepared academically, through no fault of their own but through the fault of public schools unable to challenge them sufficiently. (I attended Choate, and my freshman year of college at Bryn Mawr was easier than my senior year of high school.) And the social disconnect is HUGE. There were Prep-for-Prep kids at Choate and they had a lot of support and a cohort and it was still really hard for them. Heck sometimes it was hard for me, and my father is a doctor and my mother taught at Choate. When it seems like everyone is talking about which Caribbean island is the best, and you spent spring break at home...

This was my experience at Vanderbilt, exactly. High-achieving low-income kid, totally unprepared academically, surrounded not by the deep thinkers I'd expected but girls giggling about how much of their daddies' money they'd spent that weekend and boys who just wanted to get a high-powered job. My professors were no help at all. I managed to not flunk out only because I just didn't have any other options; I couldn't go back home, I couldn't go to another school, and I was even more terrified of getting stuck in my shitty retail job than of college. I hated college.

The knocking things over part is one of the reasons I am dubious about getting a cat. The part where they purr is a positive.

holy crap the madness at the mall in Nairobi.

So trying to not think about that. Not asking my sister if her friends are okay or if that's where we shopped when we were there (I guess every country's malls tend to look the same in the end), because that would mean processing, and I'm not.

Matt, can you get Dustbunny inside yet? Don't wait, okay? He might disappear.

No, Molly picks on him pretty fiercely and I don't want to put him in a situation where he's in an enclosed space with her and can't get away or run to his mother for safety (she usually sticks pretty close to him). He's not really to the point where I could snatch him up anyway, Molly and Jackson were consistently following me around before I wrangled them inside.

I wondered about that myself, Matt! I should have expected you'd have it under control.

I've been to Home Depot and back, they didn't give any problem with returned the bulbs despite an open package, and even directly credited my ATM card. That's pretty slick.

Getting Ben through college fills me with terror and dread, financially anyway.

I can't even think about the incident in the Nairobi mall. How is that the world we live in?

I also need to get serious about quitting smoking, but that fills me with terror and dread, too. It will sound stupid to non-smokers, but it's hard to think about quitting when you're convinced every day is going to be awful without cigarettes.

Ugh, Amy, I hear you. Try the gum or e-cig? When I fake-quit once, I used the gum, and it helped a lot. It's not cheap, but I didn't use as many pieces as they thought I would need.

I think the e-cig would help some, behaviorally, but I'm worried about the actual nicotine withdrawal. I've been a smoker for a LONG time.

I've also realized how much I use it as a crutch just to get away for a few minutes. When you smoke, you can head outside by yourself, and no one wants to go with (unless they smoke, too). And a lot of the time, it's not even about the cigarette, it's just about a quick breather.

I have a lot of friends who like the e cigs. You can make your own stuff to put in it and work down the nicotine until its just flavor and no nicotine.

Oh, absolutely. Maybe a bigger school is easier? My freshman year college roommate was Prep-for-Prep at Andover, and she did OK. Of course, she found a cohort to the extent that she couldn't talk to me for a big chunk of the year, due to her sorority's pledging rules.

Eh, I went to a big public school and also found freshman year easier than senior year (fewer classes and more free time!). Though later that changed, it was all my own slacker fault. (I mean, yes, my public school had international baccalaureate, but also metal detectors and a nursery)

When you smoke, you can head outside by yourself, and no one wants to go with (unless they smoke, too). And a lot of the time, it's not even about the cigarette, it's just about a quick breather.

Yeah, I had a boss once who only smoked when she was really stressed out, so she wasn't addicted at all, and finally just realized she could for a five-minute walk without actually smoking.