My niece was invited to play on a travelling softball team that would keep her away from home, sometimes school, sometimes overnight. She's freaking 10 years old. Brother was like "yeah, no. I know you love softball and are very good at it, but that's unreasonable."

Why would they schedule tournaments like that? Isn't that what weekends are for?

(Side note: cubey guy is playing pouty face with me today. Whuddever. It'll give him more to talk about. If people aren't talking about you, I guess you're boring.) ;)

That's a really hard one. It's nuts though. Who schedules a tournament for house teams during a school day? WTF? Are other parents OK with taking their kids out of school for this? Games should be on weekends or after school.

I'd be inclined to say NO. Even if it does screw it up for everyone else. Who can argue with you when you say school is more important? That's not a position anyone can argue against.

I asked the team manager about the other kids. he hasn't replied yet. he's a really nice sensible intelligent guy. We're the only rookie family. We already did one tourney, our Friday game was 6pm. We did have to take time off school, but only because it was so far away. And Hector was a complete noob in the net, so anyone could've filled his spot, there was no real pressure to go. This one has two Friday games -8am and 2pm. wtf? it's only 45 minutes away. I don't think it was unreasonable of me to assume the Friday games would be evening ones. But apparently it was. I don't know what in the hell to do.

In the big scheme of things I doubt he'll miss anything so critical at school it cannot be made up in an hour or two of studying. Of course, unless he is planning on an NHL career I doubt missing a game is going to be brought up with his therapist 15 years hence. It's probably gonna be something about how you cut his toast into triangles that one time when you knew he wanted rectangles...

I'm with foot--I think it's unlikely he'll really miss much on this one day of school, it's more about the precedent. This can't be a regular pattern, and if you let him go, he may think he gets to go to the next one and the next one, and the hockey coach will continue to schedule things during weekdays because kids keep coming to them.

I guess if it were me, I'd let him go to this one because of the short notice, but state very clearly to the coach that he will not be attending any more games during school hours. If he schedules them in the future, he will know he is doing it without a goalie.

I think we're going to have to roll with it. I checked with the teacher and he won't miss anything huge. It's the big finale of the season, then the team is disbanded. Next year, I'll know to mention up front that we don't do days off willy-nilly and maybe next year he'll have a back-up.

Asking around, it's not unusual, I think it must be my Brit showing that makes me so horrified (no days off school unless you're practically dead), because I don't consider school to be the be-all-and-end-all of education, so why did this horrify me so much? Being part of a sports team is also educational in its way. And apparently we could visit the nearby holocaust museum between the 8am and 2pm Friday games..... although there are no guided tours on Fridays... unless it's a Jewish Holiday -Purim is coming up....

I told the manager that for future reference he really ought to make sure that newbie families know this up front when they agree to a tourney. Maybe it's just because Hector is so awesome, they forget he's a rookie....

We had to be practically dead to take off school, too.

It's normal to be horrified. School is not the be all end all, but at the same time, you have been sending the message to your kids that school is important. To skip school for a game is diluting that message. You try to be consistent so the kids know what to expect, and then somebody else out there is forcing you to be all fickle in your message by putting you in this position. I'd be horrified too. But the bottom line is that he won't miss much in school that day, and if the teacher is OK with it, it's all good.

I wouldn't present it as skipping school -he loves school. I'd present it a choice that needs to be made (although his choice is obvious). Sure, if you pick school as part of your education, then school is important and shouldn't be skipped, but sometimes there are things that -whilst they may be not a "higher priority"- can offer different experiences which are also valuable. He will be expected to do the work that is missed. Fortunately, Friday is not a busy day for him because he is a hard worker/advance-planner and so is usually all done with the weekly tasks and has only the novel work to complete that day.

Now that I've calmed down/got used to the idea, it's more that it didn't occur to the Manager to mention this when he brought up the tourney and to check that everyone was OK with it, than the actual missing school that horrifies me. But I'll get over it. And I bet he won't do it again, either. I suspect he's appropriately upset by his oversight.

One of the monks at the monastery I lived at used to say, "We make our plans and then life intrudes."

Ifn ya Aint got a Plan,
Ya Cant change it

I cry at the dentist a lot, and I think this is entirely within the range of normal reactions and not wimpy. I'm a big cryer--any strong emotion makes me leak. But, I think there's something just very horrible and scary about someone messing with your head like that. Goes straight to the emotion centers of the brain.

right @ zippy.

swim meet tonight. nearly there, pool almost in sight ('cept for the fog)..... road closed, downed powerlines. Detour took 50 minutes. we called people behind us so they were able to take earlier detours -they all got there before us. They delayed the meet and fortunately i was transporting swimmers from one practice to another meet so they already were "warmed up".

...on the plus side, seemed to work for Hebe -personal bests in both individuals, taking 2nd in the 50 and 1st in the 200 free -and that was an exciting race -from 3rd, she sprinted the last lap to touch first, by only hundredths of a second in a two and a half minute race.

Then hampered by fog on the way home. but we're home.

y'see, I don't cry much, so it really scares people when I do. I don't think I cried at all once I left childhood until I had children of my own. that totally fucks with your tear duct function, doesn't it?