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High School Football or Day Care?
Football season is almost over, but for the past couple months, middle school students who attended high school games in several Oklahoma cities have had to sit with their parents at all times. At some schools, even if they go to the bathroom, they must be accompanied by an adult.
The Oklahoma schools' rules were implemented after a 16-year-old...Read more
Intellectually Disabled and on the Sex Offender Registry
When Adam Nesteikis was 25 years old, his friend told him to pull down his pants in front of a young girl. Adam did exactly that. This was in back in 2012.
Adam didn't realize he did anything wrong, because he is intellectually disabled. He didn't understand what it meant when, after a trial (whatever that is), he was placed on the sex offender...Read more
Birds' Words
Recently we got a birdfeeder. Luckily, I speak Bird!
Sparrow No. 1: This is just delicious! What do you call this stuff?
Sparrow No. 2: Free food.
Sparrow No. 1: Wait a sec. Is there food you have to pay for?
Sparrow No. 2: Humans do. They go to a big house filled with tables. They talk to another human who keeps smiling even though there's ...Read more
Parents Just Can't Let Go
Parents want to give their kids more independence but just can't bring themselves to do it.
That's the conclusion of a study from the University of Michigan's C.S. Mott Children's Hospital that came out this month. While parents believe it's important for elementary school kids to do things "away from direct adult supervision," the study found,...Read more
Six-Year Sentence for Consensual Teen Sex
When Henry was 18, he had sex with a 16-year-old he met on a dating app who said he was 18, too. The 16-year-old's parents found out, called the cops, and Henry was charged with a sex offense. He took a plea: No jail time, in return for seven years on the sex offense registry.
Henry's is just one of about 60 registrants' stories told by ...Read more
Manual Labor
Man versus man. Man versus nature. Man versus himself.
These, we learned in high school English, are the three great themes in all literature. To which we must add one more: Man versus newly purchased, unseemingly sleek, high-end, high-tech, high maintenance dishwasher.
What's that you say? "The Old Man and the Whirlpool" does not carry the ...Read more
Trying to Keep Horrible Crimes in Perspective
Stunned joy is what most of us felt when we learned that Charlotte Sena, the 9-year-old abducted while riding her bike in upstate New York, has been found and returned to her family -- alive.
The alleged perp has been seized, bringing the number of active Amber Alerts in the entire USA to... one: Keshawn Williams, a 15-year-old from Cleveland, ...Read more
Got Kombucha?
"Where's the milk?" I asked my best friend from high school, Gigi, as I peered into her fridge.
"It's right there!"
"Where?"
"There!"
But, as Gertrude Stein would have said -- if she needed something to pour in her coffee and wasn't confused by the idea of "milking" a non-animal -- "There's no 'there' there, only almond milk."
Gigi shrugged...Read more
Should She Have Helicoptered?
On top of everything else that is vexing about parenting, there's this: You will never know if you're doing it "right." That's because...
No. 1: What the heck IS "right"?
No. 2: How can we know what effect we've had on our kids at all? (If you have more than one, you'll notice they're not the same, even though they all had you as a parent.)
...Read more