As a parent, I would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to your organization for your decision to make your crayons and markers in such a way that they can be washed off of a freshly painted living room wall with nothing more than a wet rag and some elbow grease.  It is very much appreciated.  It is amazing how creative a young boy can be with your products in the two minutes it takes to go into the kitchen to get a second cup of coffee, and the relief felt when the blue, green, yellow, and red marks came off was wonderful

Sincerely,

Daddy J. Bear

P.S.  What happened to the razor blade thing on the big box of crayons?  I’ve had to use my EDC knife to sharpen crayons all morning.

I wanted to thank you for helping our family make a very important decision.  You see, Irish Woman and I have been struggling as to which direction to take the BooBoo’s education.  We live in an area with excellent public schools, a well-regarded secular K-12 school, and a Catholic K-8 school that feeds to the Catholic high schools, including y’all.  I am a product of public schools, and I know that with hard work by both Irish Woman and I we can make sure that Boo gets a good education in the public school system.  Irish Woman is a product of the Catholic school system here in Louisville, and even went to your sister high school for girls.

To be honest, we have been in disagreement over which way to go.  I favor the secular private school or the public schools.  Irish Woman wants to put him in Catholic schools.  It’s really a difference of opinion at this point.  With enough work and pushing, he can get a good education in public schools, and I know that both the secular and Catholic private schools can provide an excellent start to his life.  I had been leaning toward dropping my opposition to the Catholic school system due to the importance that Irish Woman places on it.

But after reading this, I have to regretfully tell you all this:

It will be a cold day in hell before a dime of our families money, a drop of our sweat, or a second of our lives are spent in support of your school or the schools that feed students to you.

You see, I have been that boy.  Halfway through my senior year of high school, I decided to postpone college and enter the military. I signed up for the delayed entry program, finished high school, then left for basic training.  I wore the promotional tee shirt and all that to school, and took all the crap my Bay Area teachers and fellow students could hand out.  I was harangued by my English teacher and guidance counselor about how I was throwing my life away.  My ‘friends’ tried to convince me that I was going to be a killer.  Exactly two people in the entire school acted like I was more than a bastard at the family reunion:  the janitor and the vice-principal.

This young man has decided to to start his adult life by doing something more honorable than partying, blowing off classes, trying to figure out how to sneak booze into the dorm, and participating in the annual re-enactment of Animal House.  He’s choosing to give up his youth to do something for all of us, and you shamed him for celebrating that decision.  No matter what policy you change now that you’ve been called out for your behavior, your attitude that anyone who decides that college isn’t the most important thing in life is less of a person won’t change.

So thank you for simplifying our decision.  We are now down to a choice between two options for our child’s education, and we won’t be bothering you with our quaint belief in such things as selfless service, duty, and honor.

Yours truly,

Daddy J. Bear

• From the “Tatonka” Department – 200 bison escaped from a farm in Iowa on Sunday. Apparently they moved pretty quickly, because reports are that they spread to five counties. Most of the beasts have been accounted for, but there are still a few buffalo out roaming. If you’re in northern Iowa or southern Minnesota, you might consider slowing down a bit as you drive. Nothing will mess up a car as much as hitting an animal as big as the car itself.
• From the “Bowling Ball” Department – A woman in England gave birth to a 12 pound, 6 ounce baby girl the other day. Reports are that it was a water birth, and the news article says it was a natural birth, so she did it without pain killers. Ladies, you may uncross your legs now. The father was unable to comment, as he is currently heading south on the M2 trying to escape the wrath of his wife.
• From the “I Need To Try This” Department – Two Georgia men were recently arrested when they were found to have pipe bombs and marijuana. Rangers from the state fish and wildlife organization were tracking what they believed to be a deer poacher when they came upon evidence that the men had been setting off pipe bombs. When asked what they were doing, the men said they were using the pipe bombs to get rid of armadillos in the yard. I’ve used a similar trick to try to get moles and gophers out of our front yard using large firecrackers. It didn’t kill any gophers, but the dirt geysers out of all the holes were pretty cool. Irish Woman made me stop when she realized that a lot of the gopher tunnels were around the gas main. I never get to have any fun.
• From the “My Bad” Department – Two U.S. Navy ships had a bit of a fender bender the other day. The U.S.S. Essex, an assault ship, and the U.S.S. Yukon, a supply ship, bumped about 120 miles from California. Apparently there was a steering malfunction on the Essex, and there is some damage, but no injuries, on both ships. I wonder how much BondO it takes to smooth out dents in a helicopter assault carrier?

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• From the “That’ll Teach Him!” Department – A judge in San Fransisco has released a man, who is charged with trying to sell an undercover agent a grenade launcher and then trying to rob the agent, released on $150,000 bond. The man must wear a tracking device, read for one hour a day, and spend half an hour each day writing book reports.  If he really wants to make the guy reconsider his life choices, I suggest having him read Ayn Rand and report back on what he’s learned.  He’ll get a lesson in libertarianism, and he won’t be going anywhere in the near future while he tries to get through the middle of Atlas Shrugged.

• From the “Suicide Watch” Department – A Ming vase recently sold for almost $900,000 at an auction in England.  While that’s quite a sum of money, it could have gone for $6.4 million if the owner hadn’t drilled holes in the vase so that he could make a table lamp out of it.  No report on the condition of the former owner, but I think we can assume his wife has given him the requisite amount of trouble over first getting rid of her favorite lamp and then for the amount of value the vase lost when he had to go and make a lamp out of it.

• From the “Don’t Mess With Grandma” Department – A 101 year old Swedish woman recently chased off a robber with a stick and her temper.  Those of you who have ever had their asses beaten by an angry Scandinavian woman will understand why the thief chose to just leave while he still could.

• From the “This Year For Sure” Department – A reporter for the Wall Street Journal has decided to find a creative way to cause his own death.  He apparently decided that being torn limb from limb before having his pieces tacked to the outfield wall at Wrigley Field would be just the way to go.  No response from Cubs management or fans has been noted, although WGN is playing a commercial for “Torches and Pitchforks” night for the next home game against the White Sox.

Some of us are raised by our mothers, some are raised by a family of women.  Both Irish Woman and I owe a lot to a group of ladies who have stepped in where our own mothers couldn’t or wouldn’t.  I’m not going into that whole “It takes a village…” meme, but if it wasn’t for a talented collection of aunts, friend’s moms, and just plain friends who are there for us when we need them, if only to give us a pat on the head and a bit of advice when we’re at our wits end, we wouldn’t have made it this far.  Like I’ve always said, it takes more than genetics to make family, and it takes more than a womb to make a mom.

So if you’re a mom, either biological, adopted, ad-hoc, or as Irish Woman calls it, a “parental consultant*”, Happy Mother’s Day!  You do the most important job I can think of, and if all you get is one day of the year to be given credit for it, enjoy yourself.

*Irish Woman refuses to be called ‘step-mother’.   She prefers to be called “Parental Consultant”.  Girlie Bear prefers to call her the “Second-Hand Mom” after seeing the similarly named movie.

M is for the multiple times I lied to the cops for you

O is for the occasional times you’d show up to parent teacher conferences

T is for the times I found you passed out on the lawn

H is for the hashish I found under the couch in ’83

E is for every time I had to pretend we were a nice, nuclear family for the pastor

R is for the record number of social workers I had in my young life

Put them all together and they spell “mommy issues”, the thing my mother gave to me!!!!!

Ladies, if you’re a good mom, you have no idea how much I respect you for it.

Don’t mind me, I’m just having my second Sunday of May flashbacks.

Slow blogging tonight.  I have a date with a beautiful redheaded Irish Woman.  She’s really cute, has a great sense of humor, and she’s only tried to kill me twice.  I think she might actually like me!

Y’all have a good evening!