Category: Parenting

In which I am irate, vagueposting

On By Luther M. SilerIn ParentingLeave a comment

I am, for only the second time since he has started going there, irritated with my son’s school. And, like, really irritated this time, not mildly irritated like the time he got in trouble over some bullshit that felt like the teacher’s fault in preschool. Sending-strongly-worded-emails irritated. How dare you make me disappoint my kid irritated.

And I don’t really want to get into details, especially since it’s 8:26 already and I’m showing signs of doomscrolling on top of everything else and I would really like to get away from my computer and go sit in a room with my kid with a book in my hand. I’m not gonna bitch about my kid’s school online, even in the mostly-anonymous format the blog affords me. But I really don’t need any external stressors right now because I know how my brain works and I’m likely to lash out at some poor fool who doesn’t deserve it because of unrelated stress, and I’m also irritated with my school for entirely unrelated reasons, and just … fuck.

In which c’mon, Medcline, help a blogger out

On By Luther M. SilerIn Geek, ParentingLeave a comment

Any of y’all have any pull with Medcline? I wanna try out their shoulder pillow. The CPAP means I can’t sleep on my stomach anymore (well, okay, the sleep apnea means I can’t sleep on my stomach anymore) and I’m tired of shoulder pain and waking up with my hands asleep. I’m sleeping a thousand times better than before I had the CPAP but I feel like there’s still room for improvement. That said, I’m not willing to drop the kind of money they want for their system on something I can’t see or touch before I buy it. Therefore they have to respect my status as an Internet Influencer and send me one for free. I have prior experience with reviewing pillows! How many Important Influencers can say that? Not many, I tell you.

So, yeah, get on that, y’all. I’m 5’10”, by the way, since that appears to matter.

There will be no ranting about postcards tonight, because I’m taking the night off, and no ranting about school either, because the boy is still sick and I ended up having to stay home with him today since my wife had unavoidable commitments at her job. He went to urgent care on Monday and was greeted with a shrug and a “Man, viruses are a bitch sometimes, aren’t they? Bring him to his regular doctor if he’s not better in a few days.” Today we took him to his regular doctor and were greeted with a shrug and a “Man, viruses are a bitch sometimes, aren’t they? Bring him back if he’s not better in a few days.” All I know is the kid’s been sleeping 20 hours a day for a week and a half but that doesn’t seem to be helping anyone find anything actually wrong with him.

Anyway. Another part of the reason I’m not doing postcards tonight is that it’s somehow 7:00 already and despite being home all day I don’t have anything ready for tomorrow yet. The fact that I spent the whole day screwing around on BlueSky might have something to do with that, I suppose. (Follow me on BlueSky, while I’m begging for stuff!) So I probably ought to go do some lesson planning now, I suppose.

Okay that’s enough

On By Luther M. SilerIn ParentingLeave a comment

My son had Parent’s Night at his school tonight and that meant that I got home from school and then had to spend two hours at another school where educators who are much more poorly compensated but also much much happier with their jobs (ilikemyjobilikemyjobilikemyjob) got to spend ten minutes each giving us thirty minutes of information each and then I had to stop and buy candy for my students tomorrow so I can motivate them to do maybe a little work in exchange for sugar and I’m also thinking that this vile nasal congestion that I’ve had for three days is maybe not side effects of the Covid shot I had on Monday but an actual God damn cold and I’m going to go lie in bed and try not to die now goodnight perhaps I shall blog again tomorrow.

Yay, nuts!

On By Luther M. SilerIn ParentingLeave a comment

It’s official: as of today, my son is no longer allergic to tree nuts or coconuts. Peanuts, unfortunately, are still on the no-go list, and are likely to remain there for the rest of his life, but he’s gone from a kid with a laundry list of allergies as a baby to just peanuts as a nearly-teenager and, even better, he’s managed to do it without ever having any reactions to anything stronger than a mild rash. Every other person I know with a peanut allergy has had to reach for an epipen at least once.

I probably have a similar post back in the archives from the Egg Challenge and the Strawberry Challenge, but the way this works is that they do a skin test first. He passed the skin test for everything but peanuts. So they pick one tree nut– apparently the allergen is common to all of them so it doesn’t really matter what kind you get– and they bring you into the doctor’s office, and they feed you a tiny sliver of the thing, then wait half an hour, then a little more, then half an hour, then a little more, then half an hour, and then a nice mouthful and this time they wait an hour. It takes forever and most of it is spent sitting around hoping to continue to be bored, because if something interesting happens it will be something terrible.

I forgot to bring a book, so I spent the whole morning holding forth on BlueSky. You should join me over there!

Also, speaking of joining me, I’m two minutes away from the White Dudes for Harris kickoff. Are you a white dude? Come on over. I don’t really plan on being there for much more than half an hour or so– from the list of Names they’re expecting, this is going to go on for hours, and I don’t have the stamina– but I’ll show up at the start and donate money again to pump up the numbers.

Tomorrow, Deadpool & Wolverine. For reals this time.

It’s official

On By Luther M. SilerIn ParentingLeave a comment

I was given twelve years, nine months and twenty-two days of fatherhood before my kid became taller than me.

I’m 5’10”, by the way. He just finished sixth grade, which means he will absolutely be topping six feet before the end of seventh.

Christ, I’m old.

On nepotism and Willow Smith’s EMPATHOGEN

On By Luther M. SilerIn movies, Music, ParentingLeave a comment

Fun fact: under certain circumstances, I’m not at all convinced that nepotism is a bad thing. Take sports, for example. My understanding is that there’s been some debate about whether Lebron James’ son Bronny ought to be entering the NBA draft or not. But here’s the thing: maybe (I have no idea, and don’t intend to check) Bronny can use his dad’s no doubt impressive influence to get drafted higher than he might be otherwise. But if he can’t perform at the NBA level, he’s not going to perform at an NBA level. There’s nothing Lebron can do if his kid goes out there and averages two points and six turnovers a game. He’s not gonna get playing time, and if he does, there are a billion people out there who are going to be losing money when he’s on the court and eventually it’s going to catch up with him. I remember when Bob Knight insisted on recruiting his son Patrick. Patrick dragged down the team. It was a terrible fucking idea and IU’s basketball program paid for it.

It seems like the place where nepotism is the biggest problem is in politics and business, along with those parts of the entertainment business where, y’know, knowing things can be useful. There are too many examples here for it to be really necessary to list any, but nonetheless, the previous occupant’s wastrel children and Meghan McCain come to mind immediately. You don’t even know about Meghan McCain because her dad was good at something. You know about Meghan McCain because her grandfather was good at something. Similarly, Eric Trump would be living in a trailer park if his grandfather hadn’t been rich. Go find a picture of Rudy Giuliani’s kid sometime. He barely even looks human.

Which brings me to Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith’s children. They have tried, tried oh so hard, to make Jaden Smith a thing. Jaden Smith’s not a thing. He’s not gonna be a thing. Because in order to actually be a thing in the entertainment industry he’d have to be talented, and if he is talented I have yet to see any evidence of it. Which is why he doesn’t show up in things that don’t have his parents’ money and influence behind them.

Now let’s talk about Willow.

Okay, you would never have heard Whip my Hair if it wasn’t for Willow’s parents. Fine. But do you happen to remember how that story ended? The kid shaved her head in the middle of the tour so that she didn’t have to perform the song any longer. She’s got all kinds of interviews talking about it, but I’ve always enjoyed hearing Will discussing it here.

Willow just released empathogen, a … jazz album? I have her two previous albums; I haven’t listened to anything earlier, although I think I’m going to have to bite the bullet and dive into her work before I discovered her on lately I feel EVERYTHING. Her last two albums have been punk rock, and they have kicked ass. This is completely different, and from what I’ve seen her first three albums don’t sound like any of these last three either. I’m not convinced empathogen is a jazz album, although it’s definitely jazz inflected, but most of the instrumentation is guitar, bass and drums; if there are any horns or other strings on there I didn’t notice them on my first listen, which I will admit was in the car and not exactly careful. The vocals are definitely jazzy. I’m not even sure I liked the damn album, but I’m absolutely fascinated by it. (Thinking about it, empathogen is as much of a jazz album as Cowboy Carter is a country album. The influence is clearly there, but you can’t pin either album down to a single genre.)

There’s been some talk in the last few days about whether Willow is a “nepo baby,” in other words, whether she owes her career to her parents’ influence or not. I would like to suggest that given how wildly, insanely eclectic Willow’s musical output over the last nine years had been, I’m really fucking glad that her parents are Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith and not Steve and Carol Smith … because the kid wouldn’t have a career if she didn’t have a leg up. The music industry doesn’t work with people who refuse to fit into boxes like this. Can you imagine what would have happened if some random fuckin’ kid told Jay-Z that she was done with her fun little hair song and wasn’t touring any longer? We’d never have heard from her again. And, I mean, we can argue about whether Will Smith as a parent should have said “Okay, baby, I got you” or, uh, something else(*), but the fact is if her parents weren’t famous I wouldn’t have these albums, and if nepotism gets me lately I feel EVERYTHING and empathogen once in a while, I’ll maybe put up with some fourth-generation news nitwit if I have to.

Suri Cruise and Shiloh Jolie-Pitt are both either already or about to turn eighteen, by the way, so I look forward to the two of them owning the world in, oh, five years or so.

(*) “Baby, Mr. Jay-Z is going to cut Daddy’s balls off and bury both of us underneath Madison Square Garden. You’re gonna grow that hair back today if I have to sell your soul to Satan to make it happen.”

I’m verklempt

On By Luther M. SilerIn ParentingLeave a comment

Forced Taught the boy to shave tonight, and his shitty little 12-year-old rat mustache is no more. He is disappointed. I have never identified more closely with my own father, who I recall having precisely the same conversation with me when he forced taught me to shave at about the same age. Also, I’ve reminded myself why I abhor disposable razors, which are even worse for a novice shaver, since he didn’t really know how to hold the razor and thus did less shaving than just shoving shaving cream around on his face.

I did not die yesterday, and in fact the boy’s team did quite well, and he managed a third place (of 23) in one of his events. The team, which is loaded with sixth graders (6-8 are eligible), did not qualify for nationals, but given that 2/3 of them had never competed before (and, oh, also, I don’t want to go to nationals) I’m pretty proud of him. That said, we got up at six and didn’t get home until about 10:30, so it was a long day, and I think all three of us feel somewhat robbed of our weekends.

Therefore: video games, of course.

Nope

On By Luther M. SilerIn ParentingLeave a comment

I was gonna blog tonight but instead I took my kid to get a weirdly-scheduled evening MRI (he’s fine, don’t worry) and now that I’m back home all I want to do is sleep.

So. Yeah.