And my vent for the day is..... ADD YOURS!

That's one huge plus for living way out in the semi-rural burbs, not many people want to put on the miles to solicit door to door out here. At our house in the city, ugh, the stream of people soliciting *whatever* was nearly constant. I really don't miss it at all.

My vent for the day is that it's supposed to rain all day and I don't think DH will be home from work in time to go get our kid from the bus stop. Under normal circumstances, I would grab the big umbrella and walk or if it's really pouring I would drive. Except I'm non-weight bearing on my driving foot for the next 10 weeks so I can't drive to the bus stop, and it will not be much fun attempting to maneuver both a knee scooter and a giant umbrella simultaneously down our patched up, bumpy, desperately in need of repaving street this afternoon to go get her if it in fact is pouring rain between 3:15 and 3:40 today.   Oh, and did I mention that I can't wear a real shoe on that foot? Yeah, fun times. Because she's only in kindergarten the bus driver won't even let her off the bus without a parent waiting, so not going is not an option. I guess I am thankful that it isn't snow like we had just last week. Now THAT would be really fun. NOT!

In this day and age of technology...the post office cannot figure out why our mail is being returned to sender before reaching our local post office. HINT: probably has something to do with the change of address software.

All the good things that happened for me last week fell apart by Monday. So fun. It doesn't help that I don't deal with disappointment well. I'm trying to tell myself that it's not a reflection on me, that I'm an ok person and I don't totally suck at my job just because of one day. It's hard though.

I am sick and tired of dealing with my ex-husband. I want to tell him if he wants to know how the kids are doing to contact the kids. I don't want to talk to him anymore. He can't seem to muster up any sort of empathy for what our son is going through right now. He said some pretty hateful things to the poor kid. And no matter how many times I tell him he's damaging his relationship with him, he just can't seem to wrap his brain around it. I had a long talk with DS about my ex last night. DS said a lot things about him and I am always trying to bridge the gap, but it was so difficult because I just kept thinking last night all these reasons my son has for not wanting to see his dad are the same kinds of reasons why I don't want to be married to him either. So I felt like I supposed to defend him and say nice things to my son, but I just couldn't. So I just empathized with him.  And then reassured him that I'm in his corner.

It's only Wednesday! Ugh. Every week from spring break to summer feels like an eternity.

My vent for the day: if you return something to the store because it doesn't work, TELL the employee that is doesn't work so that it doesn't get reshelved.

We bought three light fixtures to replace old ones and then hired an electrician to do the installation. He opens one box and said he could clearly tell it was a return. He did try to install it, but it did not function correctly. So, I had to drive to the store to buy a new fixture while paying the electrician to sit there and wait for me.

Still waiting on our tax refund. We e-filed with our tax preparer on Feb 6 and it was accepted that day. The IRS says there is a hold on it but the two people I have talked to and the person our preparer talked to said they don't know why. There is no explanation in our file and we have not received any correspondence from them. We really, really need the money this year.

I'm still grumbling about my MIL. DH's family rarely comes to our house, there are too many people and our place is small. Thank god.

They came over on the weekend for my sons birthday. The first thing my MIL does is walk into the kitchen, take a pot out to make tea, WASH the very clean pot, gets tea ready. Then she takes a thing of comet from her purse and starts scrubbing my sink and faucets with Steel wool pads and comet. It was clean already thank you very much, message received.

Two days after my son was born last year she came over to see him. She walked in, opened up the stove and started yelling about how could I let it be so dirty (wasn't that dirty) Sorry, I've been a little busy having a baby and working 90 hours a week until two days before my due date. Also, who walks into someone's home and does a fucking clean check on their stove? I just don't understand how people can be so rude to others.

Not a vent! The tax place made a mistake on our taxes but the accountant had reviewed it again and I am getting a much better return then originally thought!

18yo DD has been very difficult lately. Last night she accused me of not wanting her to go to college because I pointed out that unless she can come up with $5k by fall, she can't pay the bill to the private school she wants to attend. She refuses to talk to the local community college where she can go free! Or the university 26 miles away that would be only a grand out of pocket.

Never mind her completely unreasonable behavior lately. God help me. I now understand why girls used to married off at young ages!

My MIL came close to this once. I was on bed rest due to preeclampsia and we asked her to come to help with the kids. She attacked my housekeeping skills, accused me of making up toxoplasmosis, DH did too much, I should cook more, and I should just have another c-section instead of making her wait for me to go into labor...and it was selfish for me not to have a tubal and for DH to get a vas after the baby came. I was on bed rest! My blood pressure was not helped at all.
MILs!

She is old enough for a loan

Makes me think that taking a Sharpie to the box and writing "defective" might be a good idea before I return something!

This is a sore point with me, as you'll know if you read all this. I didn't mean for it to turn into a lecture or a book. I just hate that you might be feeling the way I did when this happened to me. 

This is what my life was until I had kids. My mom favored my brother because he 'needed' her. He was born premature after a difficult pregnancy and she always worried about him and his health. Brother is built like a bull and had the health of one, but in her mind he was always frail. Meanwhile, I had chronic asthma, but I didn't need her to give or do for me, so I took 2nd place. This is how I grew up, so I just accepted it as the way things were done.

When my DS was about 5, my brother decided to aggravate him. I wasn't there, but after a lifetime of dealing with Brother's inability to stop when asked, I had no problem picturing what went on. My son finally got a bate of it,  told his uncle, "Look, asshole, I said STOP!", and then hauled ass to where I was. My brother chased him and demanded that I let him beat my child. You can imagine what I had to say to that, right? (Yes, my son was disciplined later for cursing at his uncle, but he was also told that it was NOT his fault that Uncle behaved like that and that Uncle's behavior was not the way an adult should have reacted. He was also told that he did not have to endure that sort of teasing from anyone, but the better way to have handled it would have been to come find Mom or Dad.)

My brother was so angry, he came very close to striking me. Mom and Dad were right there, listening to him scream at me and DS, but they 'stayed out of it." Brother stomped off, grabbed his kid, and tore out of my parents' yard. Mom turned to me and said, "See what you did? Did you have to be that way? You made him so angry!" I totally lost my cool. DH, who had been in the house when this started, came running up. I told him to take DS and put him in the car. Once he was out of earshot, I gave my mom a few home truths. I told her that her attitude of me causing my brother to get angry and behave badly was the reason I had stayed with my ex after he started beating on me. I grew up with her telling me that it was my fault when someone else got upset, so it only followed that it must have been my fault that my ex had to beat me, right? I told her that she always demanded that I give way to him because he would do something stupid if he got angry, so it became my fault when he did stupid things. Then I told her the cycle ended, right there, right then. I would no longer walk a step behind any person, much less one who had such poor control over his temper. If she didn't make it a edict that he had to control himself when I was there or he couldn't come over until I was gone (I lived 4 hours away and didn't visit often) then we wouldn't be back. She told me she would NEVER tell ONE of her kids he couldn't visit her whenever he wanted. 

It was 3 years before I or my son went back to my parents' house.

Mom would call and beg for me to come so we could be a family, but she wouldn't agree to insist that Brother behave himself or leave. I would tell her that I had a family and I didn't take them to places where someone would lose his temper and threaten them with harm. My kids did get spankings, but NEVER while I was angry, and I'd be damned before someone else was going to hit them in anger. When Mom would call and get to sobbing or yelling, I would tell her that I loved her, but I wasn't exposing my family to that racket, then I'd hang up. She and Dad visited us, and we went to see my Grandmother who lived near them, but we didn't set foot on her place again until she agreed to do what I asked. By that time, my brother had enlisted, spent time in Germany, and had done a lot of maturing. He actually apologized to me and DS for his behavior and has never repeated it in any way. My kids think he rocks now.

I had to do something similar again when I realized that my mom and dad were blatantly favoring my son over my daughter. They had it in their minds that because DS was almost 8 when DD was born, DH and I were going to spend more time with her than with him. They decided they would be the place where DS could go and still be #1. When my DS asked why Gma and Pop didn't love DD like we did, I sat Mom down for another conversation. I reminded her of how wonderful my MIL had always been to my son, who was not MIL's grandchild by blood. I told her that I would have walked barefoot to MIL's house (1300 miles away) to slap her if she had ever treated my son the way Mom and Dad were treating their youngest grandchild. I have to say this really shocked my mom - she honestly didn't realize that they were still favoring DS. She apologized, but the damage was already done. DD has no relationship with my father; she is polite but completely uninterested in him. She and Mom have a relationship only because my mom lived with us for a while and I made the two of them deal with each other. They are more like friends than Grandmother/Granddaughter and my mom treasures their relationship.

Stick to your guns. It's worth it. I truly had very little self-respect until I had kids. I knew that they would model their behavior on what I said and did, so I learned to behave like I deserved respect and then to insist on being shown it. I would not hesitate to apologize for any harm I had caused or offense I had given deliberately, but I'd be damned before I'd give an apology just because some asshat was demanding it. I would also be having some serious conversations with my mom, especially if you have kids watching what's going on.

Marcy

Hey, coworker, you shouldn't spend the first half hour of your day yapping with everyone before you decide to start getting work done. Especially when you're behind from yesterday. If you can't talk and work at the same time, then shut your mouth and put your nose to the grindstone. We have a very casual atmosphere in the office and I would hate for that to change because you take advantage.