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I think it might be interesting ... the childfree giving advice to parents. Great humor potential, and it gives me a place to gripe about the latest failure in childrearing that I dealt with at the nuthouse.
Tonight's entry was a mother who called because her 14 year old son is being "disrespectful, rebellious, and he won't do his homework. AND HE HAD A LIGHTER AND HE TRIED TO BURN SNOW!!!*"
"Ma'am, did he try to kill you?"
"No."
"Is he trying to kill himself?"
"No."
"Did you take the lighter away?"
"Yes. He didn't actually burn any snow, but we might get thrown out of our section 8 housing."
"If the snow burns, you have bigger problems than that, ma'am. So, what, if anything did you do about your son's behavior?"
"I took the cables off his computer so he can't use it."
"And he didn't threaten to kill you after that?"
"No."
"None of what your telling me really qualifies for intervention by the suicide hotline and crisis center. Do you think you can keep things settled down until his outpatient center opens in the morning? They'll be there at 9AM. If you really think he needs to be in the hospital, you are welcome to drive down here in the snowstorm. Do you think you need to do that?"
"No. But he won't do his homework."
As an interesting aside ... one of my friends (forksbob) DID in fact burn snow. He cheated a bit. He worked on our college newspaper. They had a coffee pot full of burning snow in the office. They had a tendency to burn things in the office, and the editor saw the flaming coffee pot and started screaming at them ... "YOU KNOW THAT YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO BURN THINGS IN THE OFF ... IS THAT SNOW? HOW ARE YOU BURNING SNOW????!!!!!"
She went on a little leave after that, I think ...
(the trick incidentally, is not in the snow, but rather in the liberal amount of rubber cement added TO the snow that makes that work)
* Note to non-parents, or those who don't remember their years from ages 13-18 very clearly. The described behavior is indicative of a chronic condition known as "being a teenager."
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