Doesn't it feel so satisfying to beat a child's buttocks raw when they've done something awful and angered you? The old saying, "This is going to hurt me a lot more than it hurts you" just simply isn't true. Hitting is great stress relief. It's a way to excise aggression. And when it's used to punish a child who has embarrassed or otherwise angered you, it can be considered a parental duty. Discipline. We can't pull our belts off and beat the ass of the snooty lady in the Ford Explo...

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh! How do I always manage to do stuff like this? I was getting a jump start on bill paying today...I like to go ahead and set up the payments before payday so I don't forget and end up paying something late. So, I entered my amounts, set the date for payday, and clicked submit. Or so I thought. I forgot to set the date for my phone/internet bill...so it went with the default option. Today. The bill is being paid right now. At this very minute. And this...

I'm wondering if my little one might have pink eye: I couldn't get him to be still for a photo, so that's the best I could do. I noticed it this evening, and I asked him if he'd been rubbing his eyes or if his brother had done something to his eye (with two little boys, this is one of the first questions to ask when there is an injury of any kind). He said no, it felt fine, nothing had happened to it. It looks decidedly pink. I don't want to take him to school with pink eye, b...

An interesting (and I suppose very useful) lesson I've learned from Army life is this: I'm not in charge. I've learned to relinquish any imagined bit of control I've thought I had over the places where real life intersects with the life my family has fashioned. Some things are going to happen, and I'm not going to like them, and there's nothing I can do about it. I can complain. No one will care. I can refuse. No one will ask me. "Tough titties said the kitties, but the milk...

Each year I become more and more disappointed by the quality of books offered to children. Movie and cartoon and toy character merchandising has become a virus that has infected every part of our children's lives, including their literature and learning tools. Sure, reading SOMETHING is better than reading NOTHING. And sure, these merchandised versions of books make reading fun or more interesting to children. However, these types of things are like the sugars and fats on the food g...

I wanna play poker. I've never actually played poker before, and I'm pretty unfamiliar with the rules. I watched a little 'net cartoon on Texas Hold 'Em, and what I got from it is that each person gets two card that no one sees. They bet on those cards, then another card is put face up in a "community" deck. Bet again. Then another card, bet again, etc. until there are four "community" cards face up on the table. Players then use their cards and the "community" cards to make t...

My boys are easy to please. Simple to entertain. A whoopie cushion can be bought for under a dollar, and it will be funny for 4 and a half days (when it breaks from overuse). Farts really are a universal language. And with that in mind, I present the cutting edge in comedy at our house: The drawing, obviously, is not funny (well, the horrible rendering of a comic book character might be considered funny...or a brutal travesty, depending on your point of view). But the "I Fa...

My boys are easy to please. Simple to entertain. A whoopie cushion can be bought for under a dollar, and it will be funny for 4 and a half days (when it breaks from overuse). Farts really are a universal language. And with that in mind, I present the cutting edge in comedy at our house: The drawing, obviously, is not funny (well, the horrible rendering of a comic book character might be considered funny...or a brutal travesty, depending on your point of view). But the "I Fa...

I think most of you know my name. Brandie. B-r-a-n-d-i-e Brandie. Not Brandi. Or Brandy. Or Brenda (yeah, I've gotten some of THAT too). I don't know if my name suits me. It's a weird thing to think about, but I do think about it from time to time. To me, 'Brandie' is a slut name. It's popular, but not incredibly popular, and my spelling is just rare enough that no one in the universe can spell it right. I was supposed to be 'Brandy', but my great-grandmother told my mo...

(An email from mom) My mom sends me all sorts of emails, and it seems that everyone in my family has some sort of obsession with breasts. Therefore, I was not all that surprised to find an email from her titled, "Winner of the Wet T-shirt Contest." Being curious, I went ahead and opened it... All I have to say is, "Daaaayumm!" Hahahhahhahahaha...

(An email from mom) My mom sends me all sorts of emails, and it seems that everyone in my family has some sort of obsession with breasts. Therefore, I was not all that surprised to find an email from her titled, "Winner of the Wet T-shirt Contest." Being curious, I went ahead and opened it... All I have to say is, "Daaaayumm!" Hahahhahhahahaha...

Listen up, mainlanders... Just 'cause you put pineapple in it, doesn't mean you've created a Hawaiian dish! You put pineapple on your pizza. So what? Now it's Pineapple Pizza. It AIN'T Hawaiian Pizza, and I don't care what Papa Johns says. Your chicken dish has green bell peppers and terriyaki sauce and pineapple chunks. It's not Waikiki Chicken! It's Terriyaki Chicken with Pineapples and Green Bell Peppers! Yeah, yeah, the pineapple symbolizes hospitality and aloha...but it ...

This child clearly has ape ancestors. Try to deny it. Hehe. Kidding, but aren't you glad this wasn't ANOTHER "Evolution vs. Intelligent Design" debate article?

Xavier is a very industrious child and very interested in justice, in our household and elsewhere. Therefore, it only made sense that he would come up with a very detailed discipline chart and request that Adrian and I implement these new rules that he'd worked so hard to reason out. The top of the chart has drawings on him and of his brother, each with five stars (with boxes for check marks above them) that lead to a drawing of a piece of candy labeled "treat." Five instances of go...

So I've been called a flirt. I don't mean to do it. I don't even really consider it flirting. It's just being friendly and chipper. Hell, I do it with women, too. What is flirting? Is flirting wrong when you're in a committed relationship? Is THIS flirting? My husband and I are in Blockbuster, looking for the movie Holes. I am in an aisle alone, and I look up to see a friendly looking Blockbuster employee. He smiles and asks, "Is there anything I can help you with?" I smi...