48 thoughts on “Friday Open Thread”

  1. Taking M to our brand-spanking-new urgent care this morning. She woke up with a wicked sore throat and no voice and considering the germ fast that was her night last night, it seems like a strep test may be in order. Kids are off school, so I’m hoping to bake a bit today and maybe do a little present wrapping.

  2. Stormageddon slept through the night twice in a row (11:15-5:30 and midnight-6:45). He’s lulling us into a false sense of security and I don’t even care. Especially as he sure as heck doesn’t nap.

    Have to run a teleconference training at noon. I’m debating whether or not to drive to the capital (just over an hour away) to be with my co-facilitator in person. I’d have to take Stormy. Agency took the idea of a webinar and decided for very good reasons to run it by phone. Ignoring the very obvious problem that they are very different things.

    • Yay stormy! Just enjoy the sleep now, when you get it!

      I wouldn’t take him. When my older dd was a newborn I debated taking her to a work conference ( which I wasn’t facilitating, no less) and the vote from everyone here was no. It could be distracting and take away from your professional image. Plus stormy and little F are similar in personality so I’m guessing you’d have to pay more attention to him than the conference. Unless expat goes with you, i vote stay home. I went to my conference but dh brought the baby by so I could nurse her on a break.

      • Not only did I enjoy the sleep, I got to shower *and* drink my coffee before it was cold (and eat half my Cheerios before they turned to mush). It’s a good day.

        Sorry, wasn’t clear–it’s a call-in teleconference, one hour long, scheduled to coincide with people’s lunch breaks–a quick last-minute class to allow people to make up CEUs if they’re short for the end of the year. It would be just me, my co-facilitator, and the agency person in the room and I’ve got the green light to bring him (in fact, I got a “please do”–the agency person is baby-crazy and doesn’t need to participate during the call). We’ve all worked together closely for several years now.

        From a training POV it would work much better to be in the same room as my co-facilitator; the big downside is the hour commute since I’ll be taking care of him either way. You’re right that he’ll probably want to be entertained.

        For today I’m going to try doing it from home (especially because, miracle of miracles, he’s napping at the moment, which means he almost certainly won’t be at noon!) and Expat will come watch him for part of his lunch break; but depending how it goes, I may take him to the 2nd session on the 17th (of 2).

  4. Hey gals! Apparently some peeps are having trouble staying logged in or logging in. Can you please message me or Erika with a description of the error you get? The tech guy, aka my dh, will be working on the problem. This is a crazy time for us (just moved in, newborn, and major huge interview for him on Wednesday) but he’s going to work on the problem as much as time allows this weekend. Thanks!

  5. Wow. Prudie has a letter from a nanny of 4 year old twins who have a 65 year old single mother. Crazy. Thinking about it though, while this situation is odd because she had fertility treatment to cause this to happen, there are plenty of grandmas out there raising young children as well and they don’t tend to get discussed much. Having little kids is a lot of work for anybody, let alone somebody older.

    [Thanks to Rachel for the fact that I can make links now...!]

    • There was a mom in our kindergarden readiness program who was 68 or so and had a 5 year old. Her other kids were 50 and 52. Cra!!!!! She wasn’t open to discussing it though. But she was insistent that no, it was not her grandson (or great grand!), it was her son. She had been retired before he was born but looking for work. I felt sad for her because I doubt she was “bored” with retirement like she claimed. I’m sure they needed income to raise this child. Or she could really be bored, but being almost 70 raising a very active 5 year old and being bored is not something I can wrap my head around.

  6. I’m looking at photos of the first couples receiving marriage licenses in Washington state and blubbering like a baby… good thing my desk faces away from my door

  8. Anthem sucks. They paid 100% of H’s OT/PT just a year ago. Then today? I get a $1500 bill for his latest round of PT. The reason? He’s too old. Apparently, he wasn’t allowed to receive services after the age of 3. The fact that his first round of PT (for which they paid) was when he was 9 seems to not matter a whit.

    I called and complained and the phone rep said it was probably better not to look at it too hard- otherwise they might come back for the previously paid services and demand reimbursement. I don’t know if that’s even possible, but I’m not pushing.

  9. No phone call from potential employer , which either means they picked someone else, or they haven’t decided yet, or it could mean absolutely nothing.

  10. You guys!!!!! Thank you soooo much for the gift cards! You have no idea how much this helps, at this time of year and with all the little expenses of the move! I’ve already got a list of stuff I need at Tarhet! Thank you so so so much for everything, and for your friendship. I love you guys so much!!!

  11. Does anybody watch Girls or any other Lena Dunham related media? Every time I open a pop culture review they are talking about her but we don’t have HBO and I’ve never seen it.

Leave a Reply