Gold star for good parenting!!

I'm not a parent and don't pretend to have any expertise or experience in dealing with small children in the home, pretty good at dealing with teenagers though!!

As a teacher, I have the blessing of having 10 weeks a year in holidays. The curse is that I share them with children and families who are also forced to take their holidays at this time. Through observing family excursions and dealings with parents, I've made a few decisions about how I want to be a parent.

I recently visited Canberra. I saw many examples of "bad parenting" and a few of good. At the Australian War Memorial, I was flabbergasted at the number of families dragging small children around the exhibits. Two questions for these parents:
a) Are the children old enough to understand and appreciate the exhibits? Is it appropriate to take children there?
b) Do your children have an attention span long enough to pay attention and not irritate other patrons?
On the most part, the answer was a resounding NO! I'm all for taking children on excursions and broadening their life experience, its how we learn, but it needs to be appropriate!
The same rule can be applied to the well meaning mother who had 3 children under 6 at the dawn service, talking during the minutes silence. Firstly, you need to prepare children for what is to come. A friend suggested to me that children are unpredictable. What was she supposed to do he asked? My reply, though harsh, was don't come.
These parents needed the same lecture as a man who took his seven year old to a war museum in Vietnam that contained human specimens resulting from Agent Orange exposure. No small children at war related events!!

Conversely, at the National Museum in Canberra there was a family of four. The two little girls were so engaged in a film about artifacts to be found in the museum that they called out,"Dress, mummy, dress!" each time a frock was on the screen. Their parents quietly shushed them, but then talked to them about the things they saw at the end. Dignified, well done. And the kids weren't irritating at all!

I find that all this tends to go unspoken about. I have seen people I truly admire as they deftly calm their small children and weave them through public places with little mishaps, never once losing it. I think they should know. I'm now going to carry gold star stickers, hand them out to people I want to emulate.

I is a big girl

I can solve my own problems, don't necessarily need someone else to do it for me. However, I do happen to have the unfortunate habit of discussing them with people.Or whinging, more to the point. This gives the wrong impression. I have usually thought the issue through and am merely voicing these thoughts out loud. This is often handy, something said in the head may not be so crazy but out loud is cuckoo town. Saying it out loud means that I may not do something silly in the future or say something to people who are less supportive (ie discreet about insanity in friends).
However, I have lately had a problem with some (predominantly male) friends feeling that my whinging means that I would like my problem to be solved by them. This would be fine if it did not inevitably end up making things infinitely worse... If it doesn't involve mouse traps, putting up pictures or power tools (these I like to call "boy jobs", more commonly known as jobs I don't like doing), then listen patiently, pat me on the head and distract me with something shiny!

I'm not being cynical, just giving some advice...

After a recent confusing 'half' relationship, I have some advice to give men who are not entirely sure if the girl they are currently seeing is for them (the fact that you are thinking that at all is the first clue). These are collected from my own and others' experiences where a slightly significant other cannot find it in them to be completely honest and end up in a pickle. I'm not saying it's intentionally malicious, it just happens often.
Call it "Ways not to mislead"
1. On a date, after a snog, do not hold a girl's hand and say "I feel just like a teenager again". This implies feelings that you may not actually have, you are making the recipient believe otherwise.

2. "You're a really good kisser." This implies it is something you would like to continue doing on a number of occasions in the foreseeable future and only with this person.

3. "You should show me how to do that sometime." This one is wrong for a number of reasons. Firstly, it says that you are planning ahead which you may or may not be doing. Secondly, when said in the bedroom it means something altogether different... Wanting to please someone there is heading for intimacy people!

4. "I am nervous of being rejected." Roughly translated for women as "I like you and am concerned that I will be the one to get hurt."

5. "I think you're a really clever, organised, outgoing person." Insert any compliment here. Unless its sincere, don't say it. And if it is sincere, realise that saying it implies some sort of affection or intent.

6. "Tell me something about yourself." Showing interest in a persons view of themselves and past is merely a version of 'I want to know everything about you' hence want to know more about you in the future.

7. Coming to my house for dinner with wine and planned dessert. Now that surely should be obvious to everyone.

8. A hand on the small of the back is a protective/possessive gesture. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

9. "I'm really a serial monogamous." backed up with "Men tend to date more than one person at once." Make up your freaking mind!!

10. "I'm really enjoying lying here listening to music with you."... Aah, I give up.

I personally have some rules that may apply to others.
I may be interested in, flirting with, dating more than one person at a time but I only sleep with one.
When I say I like you, I mean that I would like to be more than friends. Even more so when in bed with you (here's me thinking this was a given).
If you are confused and not sure if what you want is actually only a friendship with benefits, just bloody well say so. I'm a big girl and can make the choice for myself. Please don't assume that you are the most important thing happening in my life. Dealt with much bigger issues.

I tell the truth regardless of how this makes me appear to others or how much it will hurt me in the future. At least people will know where they stand. Honesty beyond self.

Brain first, mouth second

I decided a number of weeks ago to make a couple of household purchases - air mattress and blender, how exciting! As the Red Dot Boutique was advertising a sale, I logged onto their website to ensure that what I had seen advertised was indeed true, the items I require on sale. Don't want to go to a shopping centre and return empty handed, all that pain for nought. But there they were, just as promised.
So I got me down to the nearest outlet, found my air mattress then wandered fruitlessly around the store looking for my promised blender. Sale signs all around, electrical goods but no blender. There were a number that looked similar but I was a little unsure which was on sale. Found me a 'customer service representative'.
"Excuse me, I believe there was a blender on sale in your catalogue. Could you please show me which model is on sale?"
She pointed to the items stacked around enormous red 'SALE' signs, "These are the things on sale."
Patient face on, I replied,"Yes but is there a blender on sale?"
She started walking in a purposeful manner to the electrical items, gestured and said,"These are our blenders."
I thought I would give it one more go. "Which is the one that is on sale in your current catalogue? I saw it on your website."
"There isn't one for sale. Are you sure it was our website?"

There are a number of assumptions I make about this interaction, although I have had worse. I have to believe that
a) the girl was stupid or more disturbingly
b) she is so used to dealing with complete idiots that this is her standard response.

At no point did she listen to all the information given to her before forming an answer. This, people, is why I teach.

Lesson 1. Brain first, mouth second.