If It Ain't Broke, Don't Try To Fix It

Our daughter is such a blessing. Whenever anyone in our family is not feeling well, either emotionally or physically, she behaves in such a selfless, tenderly compassionate way towards them. And this behaviour has been typical of her since she was able to communicate in her own limited way. Even when she was a new born who could barely control her limbs, she would often strive to hold out her little hand so she could touch my face when I nursed her several times each day. Truly amazing, We feel so blessed to have her unconditional love manifesting in our family.
And we aren't the only ones who feel like this. She has affected her teachers and educational assistants this way too, for the last nine years. To the point where she has even brought many of them to tears by her expressions of pure, unconditional love, or so they have told me.
There's no doubt about it; she is extremely loved and loveable.
Sadly, the bond that ensues when she works her magic on everyone outside our family has caused us grief at times. Grief that others have a really hard time comprehending. It has to do with our roles as parents and how others have neglected to honour our privacy and it has showed up almost predictably every so often when someone who has minimal life experience, lacks sensitivity, or isn't a very good judge of human character, spends significant time with our daughter.
Here's how it goes down.
About halfway through the school year, someone gets inordinately attached to her and we get the inevitable phone call from them. Sometimes they have even been known to manipulate someone else to make the phone call, but either way, that call gets made.
The phone rings and the call display shows it is the school our daughter attends. The person on the other end of the line politely introduces themselves and whatever role they have in the school and then the real fun begins.
I have had comments made on the content of our daughter's lunches, comments made about the state of her health (which, because she had open heart surgery when she was an infant, I am hyper vigilant about and practice intense preventative medicine in order to see that she is super healthy at all times - typical behaviour of anyone who has had a child go through what our daughter has been through) and comments made about the fit of her clothing. You name it, I have had some nosy, controlling, insensitive, educational professional overstep their boundaries, assume I am NOT doing my job and make that first phone call, which leaves me feeling incredibly violated and wondering what would happen if I were to reverse that pattern and call them about the personal non-educational issues in their family members I thought needed correction, advice or just plain old intervention.
Honestly, I have heard it all.
One time, I got a series of phone calls about a runny nose. Our daughter had caught a cold and because, most of the time she rarely even broke a fever, I generally sent her to school even with a runny nose and that is what had happened this time. And let's be honest, most kids do go to school when this happens if they are still energetic and happy and seem otherwise fine. They stuff their pockets with Kleenex and off they go. No big deal. While I am very careful about anything that looks serious, I will not coddle my children. Anyway, the point remains that she was not really ill. But the EAs and her teachers apparently thought I was being negligent and called several times insisting I pick her up. Finally, one of them even had the gall to say she had a sinus infection because she knew all about how to diagnose these things. What? My first impression was that those frequent PD days must include medical training to teachers now. I asked her how she knew and she got quiet and then said it could be determined by the colour - excuse me for the graphic nature of this information - of her snot. I almost laughed aloud. I was tempted to say, "And I assume then you are checking the mucous output of all of your students in order to determine who goes home and who stays put?" But I knew I couldn't say that and so I just politely told her I did not agree and that every time I had foolishly taken her to the doctor his consencus was she was fine and not to pay attention to every Tom, Dick and Harry who said she was unwell when my own good, well-honed motherly instincts said otherwise. I mean, Jeez Louise.
Then there was the time that I got a call from the school counselor who said my daughter was coming to school regularly with clothing that was too small for her and therefore uncomfortable. Du uh. Earth shattering, sure to cripple her for life kinda stuff.  Bet it made that counselor really feel she was earning her salary that month. To clarify that one, what had actually happened was, for three months in the fall, my husband had dressed her for school. Most of the time he had chosen something that was just fine but a handful of times, she had gone to school with too tight jeans and, indeed, the counselor was right about this on those few isolated occasions. And I was aware of it, having thrown out the offending pants. But that was several months earlier and by the time I got the call, Christmas had come and gone and do you know what Santa and everyone who loved her gave her under the tree? Let me see if I can count. There were 14 pairs of pants, 17 shirts, three sweaters, 18 pairs of sox, several new bras, two new pairs of good quality winter boots, some new shoes and, if memory serves me correctly, some outer winter wear, including mitts and a new hat. Whew. It took her a while to unwrap it, she got so much. Nobody and I mean NOBODY in their right mind could say with integrity that our daughter isn't or wasn't well cared for. And yet, when I immediately responded with an, "Are you kidding me?" (this time I withheld nothing from my gut response to this self righteous, totally inaccurate attack on our reputation as parents) and, "Do you realize how incredibly innappropriate this is?", followed shortly afterward with, "If our daughter were normal would you be making this phonecall?" she had the stupidity to say, after a short pause, "Yes, of course." Needless to say, I said, "I think not," and as soon as I hung up I called the principal to explain what had happened. My blood pressure went up as he thinly tried to defend his staff member. I suggested that if the problem had been dealt with back when it had happened, maybe I would not have responded so intensely. But this was three months after, when the problem had been remedied by an onslaught of new clothing over the holidays. To boot, it had never even been a real problem of concern. I undressed my daughter that fall every evening when I gave her a bath and took care of her after school and I was totally aware of how many times she had been sent to school with too tight pants and I can tell you, not only had I asked my husband to take better care when choosing her outfit, but I knew it had only happened a few times. Go figure.
And it wasn't like she was being dressed immodestly. I would have totally gotten that, I really would have. I happen to strenuously agree with school dress codes and think they should be enforced rigorously. Or perhaps if I had been made privy by the principal to any corrections of other students' dress habits, I may not have felt so singled out for this idiocy. I mean, haven't we all seen kids trotting off to school dressed in shorts on a milder day in winter and wondered what the parents were thinking about? It happens all the time and nobody, surely not a teacher, EA or principal ever addresses it. Not by a long shot. They'd be too scared. And you know why? It's because the reason those kids are dressed that way in the first place is because the parents probably weren't aware of it or perhaps did not really give a rat's patootie and no education professional in their right mind wants to tangle with anyone of that ilk. No, they save all their misplaced aggression for the good ones, the ones who are likely to be deeply marked by this kind of stuff. i.e. - Parents like us...
Furthermore, I do not know when teachers, counseling staff and EAs suddenly decided it was OK to violate folks like us in this manner. It doesn't help at all and more often, we who are the most responsible, who are actually giving the best care to our children because we do have refined sensibilities and strong connections with them, are compromised and hurt. Not to mention stressed unfairly. Honestly, when parents are negligent, even this kind of crap doesn't mean diddly to them. And then, no change takes place. It takes a sensitive, responsible, good parent to be hurt.
And honestly? I have only seen these phone calls come in on the short days of the year, when teacher burnout is at an all time high and students from broken homes whose parents really don't give a rip mostly because they haven't got a clue how to, make it hard to be a teacher or EA or school counselor.
I hope someone who has the day-to-day, educational professional care of a school aged, disabled child reads this and learns from it. I really do.
Maybe then we folks who are doing our all out best will catch a break.

Pity the Powerless Press or Whose Country Is This, Anyway?

A few years back I attended a Maritime Print Journalism program. I applied for an internship with CBC Radio and was given the privilege of working alongside its broadcast reporters for the duration. Shortly into that experience, I started to realize how little reporters really know about things in our governments, at almost every level. I became so disenchanted and disillusioned about the subject I swore I would never work in that style of journalism again. True to my vow, I have kept as far away from political commentary as is possible.

But every once in a while I just hafta take off my self-righteous hat and get my hands dirty. This is one of those times.

Everyone has, no doubt, been reading or hearing all about how the Canadian government is planning to axe an old Canadian social programs standby – the old age pension, which has been given to anybody once they reach the age of qualification, whether they have earned wages in their lifetime or not. The powers that be have softened the blow by suggesting that only those who will retire in 15 to 20 years will be affected. Apparently, the researched projections predict the fund will be bankrupt at that time.

It’s a bloody shame, but not surprising at all.

Anyone with an ear to the ground has seen this one coming for some time. Stephen Harper’s government has been chafing at the bit to reduce outgoing monies such as the billions this pension represents, since they became a majority government in our last federal election. Knowing its tireless obsession with cutbacks to social programming in general, this has been just one more in a long list of major changes in anything that even slightly reeks of Trudeaumania.

As if that weren’t enough, I noticed over the last few days something that honestly made both my eyebrows and blood pressure rise.

GM in Canada, which received a gargantuan bailout of billions of our tax dollars just a couple of years ago, announced it had its best year of profit ever in 2011. They are, by their own count, roughly ahead a few billion more than what Stephen Harper’s Conservatives gave them. And they even had the audacity to publicize it, as if to rub in that the monies they received from us were without so much as an interest payment expected in return.

Does anyone else besides me see the idiotic hypocrisy of this situation?

Here, on the one hand, we have a government which seeks applause for its hard line approach to cutbacks in spending, aggressively and with no thought to those who have come to depend on social programs, making cutbacks in those selfsame programs. Then they turn around and give, not lend, but give a major corporation which isn’t even owned by Canadians, billions of our tax dollars so as to keep open its assembly plants in central Ontario where thousands of Canadians were employed. To boot, the one thing Stephen Harper did get out of the deal was a load of GM stock, which, reportedly isn’t even worth the paper upon which it is written. And I am pretty certain the workers didn’t see any life changing raises in the last year, despite the red letter year GM has had.

Essentially, the Canadian people have, once more, come up empty handed. On both counts.

Seems to me this government operates as the antithesis of Robin Hood, robbing the poor to pay the rich.

I haven’t seen too many reporters writing about this over the last few days and I really wonder why either they have missed it or don’t consider it important enough, if they did see it.

This is what I meant by the press not having any real clout in our society.

Besides, we are all so busy just trying to stay afloat, we don’t have the time to read this stuff, anyway. So I guess it’s a losing battle.

Too bad. But maybe there’s more than one way to skin a rabbit.

I wonder if I were to start a business, incorporate and hire a whole lot of workers, I could ask Stephen Harper to give me a big chunk of cash to pay them?

It’s worth a try.

Better still - why don’t we hire GM’s CEO to run the country?

Cultural Calamity John or Be Careful What You Tell Your Kids

About a dozen years ago or so, our family was uprooted while my husband sought work in our nation’s capital. He had just graduated from an IT course and felt his chances for a good position were best in Canada’s Silicon Valley. Because things were tight at first, we chose to rent an older style townhouse on the border of Ottawa and Nepean, in the middle of a large community of recent immigrants who came to our country from all over the world.  It proved to offer a literal smorgasbord of education for us all as we slowly got to know all of our new neighbours.

                Not too long after we moved in, our son, who was about three-and-a-half, started playing with a little boy who was the son of one of those new neighbours. They were from Turkey and the little boy, a smiling and giggling, happy little fellow, was their first and only child.

In the first few weeks after we moved in, our son had a few adjustment issues, including the odd nightmare. Like any good Christian mother would, I tried to nip it in the bud by explaining to him that each time he had a dream, he could exercise power over it. I said he could tell it to go away in Jesus’ name. Each night, as I helped him say his prayers, I would go over what I thought would both reassure him and eliminate the nightmares. He listened closely to every word, agreeing to do it if he had a one again.  Predictably, as he made friends and got busy with new adventures, the nightmares seemed to abate and I forgot all about what I had told him.

Have I mentioned that my husband’s father is Greek Canadian? And that would make our son one-fourth Greek? Just thought I might throw it in for good measure.

So, one day, the two boys were playing in the courtyard behind the townhouses while I watched closely from a lounge chair perched on the postage stamp bit of green that was our back lawn. I was largely pregnant with our second child and it was horrifically hot and humid.

I had learned very soon after our arrival that this kind of weather was typical of south-eastern Ontario. One morning previous to that, we had awoken to temperatures in the mid nineties Fahrenheit and there was actual fog until the midday sun had burned it off. Even our African immigrant friends, whose home countries knew mean temperatures of close to 100 degrees Fahrenheit, said they found the National Capital Region beastly hot because of the humidity and continual lack of what would have been a merciful breeze.

So, you have to understand, unless I absolutely had to, there was no way I was going to get actively involved in the play activities of preschoolers. But I was making certain, at least, they were safe and happy.  At one point, they disappeared around a corner of one of the townhouses for just a moment, and as I started to raise my girth to get up and follow, as I did not want to leave them unsupervised, the air suddenly became riddled with the shouts of the two boys. I wasn’t sure what they were saying, but whatever it was, it sounded pretty intense. Just as suddenly, they whizzed back around the self same corner around which they had disappeared, flying like the wind, with our son chasing the little Turkish boy. They looked like a miniature Mutt and Jeff. Our son was very tall and slim for his age and his little friend was extremely short and stocky, his rapid but clumsy gait no doubt encumbered by a pull-up.

It was then I realized little boys really do listen to their mother’s instructions.

Because, see, as they both ran by me, our son waved a stick and I heard him yell at the top of his voice, “Go away in Jesus’ name! Go away in Jesus’ name!”

I thought to myself, How succinct – the Greek chasing the Turk while yelling holy invocations at him.

I tell ya, history really does repeat itself.

Good Thing I Don't Have A Heart Condition or Layover Lapse

About a year or so after 9-11, I was traveling to Los Angeles during the Christmas break with my eight-year- old son. We had friends who had an empty house in Glendora, which is one of the small satellite communities around Los Angeles proper, and they had given us an open invitation to come on down anytime at all. We were due a fun holiday somewhere warm. I thought, what better place to visit than America’s sunny southern California, the home of theme parks, movie studios and miles and miles of sandy beaches?

So there we were; enroute to LAX on a late morning flight, via JFK airport in Newark. When we showed up at the airport in Halifax, where the first leg of our journey began, the ticket agent told us that both airports we were scheduled to visit that day were on high alert because of some terrorist threat, so we were counselled to expect delays and extra vigilance on behalf of staff.

I nodded politely to the agent and promptly forgot about it.

I should mention it was the second time my son had flown. The first was when I was pregnant with his sister and we were headed back east together from Ottawa to visit his Nanna. For the record, that had been my first flight as well. He was then a little tyke, almost three years old. Once we were comfortably seated, he turned to face me; his chocolate brown eyes wide open as the plane took off. He said, “Scary plane, Mom?”

This time around, he didn’t feel the need to ask any questions like that. He was Cool Hand Luke, all over again. I had given him permission to take one of his stuffed animals with him and he had appropriately chosen a fluffy white bear with a long, knitted red scarf around its neck. He called it Canada Bear. My son, the foreign relations expert. There was even a maple leaf on his luggage tag. His idea, not mine.

When we landed in Newark about an hour-and-half later, we had a rather long layover scheduled in; about three or four hours long. But, before we had time to eat and rest, we had to go through American Immigration and Customs, as this was our port of entry to the U.S.

Line-ups were incredibly long. I had made the mistake of booking a flight around the time when most of the students in North America were going home from their respective colleges and universities. If we were going to take advantage of my son’s school break, however, it was the only way to go. But nothing could have prepared me for the line-ups I saw there that day. I did a head count and some of them had almost two hundred people. So we slowly walked through two different queues for about a half hour apiece. It was tedious, to say the least.

Once we got to the head of the second line, the young officer there didn’t have very much to say. He did have what appeared to be a permanent frown and, I think, a Slavic accent.  At one point, he looked me up and down, slowly, several times. It was most discomfiting. I almost told him about the cookies I had stolen when I was four years old; just to get him to stop staring at me with those pale blue eyes of his. I felt like a scuba diver surrounded by sharks. Suffice to say he made me really nervous. My son’s teddy bear seemed to bring him out of his strange demeanor however, and he spoke respectfully to him – my son, not the bear - as he passed his furry white companion through the scanner.

Once we cleared Immigration, next was Customs, where another long line-up awaited us. Except this time, we had to pull our luggage behind us as well. And Canada Bear was riding on top of it all, grinning mischievously to everyone, including us.

The line was barely moving. I looked ahead to see what was delaying us and saw another officer, a tall, broad shouldered African American man, dressed in an official looking uniform. He had - what I assumed at this point was standard dress code for that airport - a frown on his face. I can tell you, he looked foreboding. I swallowed hard. I hadn’t enjoyed being silently grilled by the last guy and I sure wasn’t looking forward to meeting this dude.

After what seemed like forever, we finally reached him and I handed over my boarding pass as well as the document the Immigration officer had given me, trying hard to look what I thought appeared innocent. He looked at the papers and then looked at me. Twice. By then I was perspiring heavily and he hadn’t even said anything yet.

I wondered if it was something they were taught – How to intimidate potential threats to America by giving them the silent treatment. Or maybe they could actually read our minds. Well, not read our minds literally, but figure out if we were gonna be trouble by reading some subtle, unspoken signals only they could read. I’d heard of stranger things. That must be it, I thought, and my heart began to beat a little bit faster.

Oh crap, I thought, what to do now?  Was my face flushed? Was I licking my lips too much? Breathe, girl, breathe!! My mind raced. This was bound to be bad, the way things were going and all I could think about was, would they be gentle when they strip searched me? Surely they’d consider the fact I had a little boy, an innocent child, with me.

Then he spoke and I nearly wet my pants as it jarred me back into reality.

“Where’s the third person in your party?”

“Wha....?” I stuttered like an idiot. A desperate idiot.  And that’s when I did something really stupid - That’s when I made an adrenaline charged lunge for the documents, claiming I wanted to see where it said there were three people in our party. I did not think about the fact that this guy was easily two times my weight and a good foot-and-a-half taller than me. Not to mention he probably had a semi-automatic firearm on a holster slung across his chest, under his uniform jacket, ready to use at a moment’s notice.

As this scene unfolded in slow motion, just as if my mind were in a parallel universe, I experienced visions of being thrown in jail and having to be bailed out by some sympathetic American democratic pacifist – they did fly, didn’t they? - after having missed our connecting flight, all on account of some guy - correction; two guys - who thought I seemed suspicious. My mind raced through the many permutations and possible outcomes of the situation, while my son hung onto my hand, smiling happily at the officer, oblivious to what was going on.

And it all happened in about two or three seconds. But, to me, it seemed like an eternity. Crazy.

I even remember this fine specimen of JFKs Homeland Security smelled like cheap cologne and some kind of breath mint. Wintergreen, I think.

Then he let out a deep chuckle and his eyes crinkled up at the corners.

“Go on,” he said, motioning us through with his big meaty hand.

How do you spell relief?

O-H-W-O-W-H-E-W-A-S-J-U-S-T-K-I-D-D-I-N-G!!

Blue Monday At Our Daughter's School

This past week, I had a horrible experience at the hands of educational staff at our daughter's school, who decided to take out the frustrations of their after Christmas "blues" on what they thought was the weakest link in the chain of educators and caregivers -yours truly.
And I am sad to say, it wasn't the first time this has happened to me, either. No, it happened a few years back at another school, when I unfortunately had to insist on a face-to-face meeting with the staff concerned, in the presence of the principal. Thankfully, justice prevailed and my sense of dignity was restored, as the principal, who wasn't involved in the process in the first place, had to agree with my point of view and firmly corrected the staff member in question and the experience was never repeated at that school. I would like to think it was because they learned not to tangle with me, but, sadly, I think it was because the next year's roster of educators and educational assistants were much less anal than the previous' years.
So let me inform you about what went down.
Let's start by saying that our daughter, whom I mentioned has Down Syndrome, needs full time assistance with self care and other issues, because of her global developmental delay. In those departments, she is pretty much text book. So she has the right to full-time educational assistants when she goes to school. The assistants help her with her special curriculum requirements and also with things like feeding, teeth brushing, bathroom chores and so forth. Nothing earth shattering about it really.
But here's where it gets a little trickier. When she gets a cold she isn't able to always monitor when she needs her nose wiped and because she also has greatly delayed speech, she doesn't articulate well things like feeling sick or being in pain. However, in the absence of her skills in that area, I have learned to monitor all of her serious illness symptoms and levels of discomfort and I know exactly when it is time to bring in a medical professional. Thankfully, because both my children are, I am very proud to say, well fed and cared for, they rarely get seriously ill and they miss very little school.
OK, so we have established this much.
So this week was one of those times when she was sniffling, had a runny nose and sounded and looked, actually, much worse than she really was. There was no lack of energy or enthusiasm, no fever - I check each morning and often throughout the day - and not even any refusal to eat food, which has proven to be one of the most reliable signs that something is afoot. So I sent her to school after dressing her up like Charlie Brown and packing a nutritious, hot lunch.
End of story. Or so I thought.
It's noon and I am sitting down to some reheated, leftover, homemade chicken soup. The phone rings and I answer. A young, female voice introduces herself as our daughter's school counselor. After the niceties, she goes on to say that she has been appointed to call me to inform me that our daughter's clothing has been too small for her on a regular basis.
"You're kidding me!" I said, not believing my own ears.
She repeated the complaint, adding that our daughter's pants have been making marks on her sides and even her shirts have been too small at times.
Then I realized this had a familiar ring to it. And instead of feeling like the little boy whose mother caught him at the cookie jar after school, I proceeded to inform her, plainly and firmly, that she was being incredibly innapropriate. I then asked her if our daughter were "normal" would we be having this conversation. There was a slight pause and then she had the gall - and in this case, lack of insight and wisdom - to answer with "yes".
I tell ya, my chin clanged as it hit the floor. Truly.
For the sake of my readers I will say that a few times BEFORE Christmas, my husband, who was getting our daughter our the door in a big hurry, accidentally put on a small pair of pants. I doubt it happened more than two or three times all autumn. I saw it when she returned from school and promptly aprised him of it, suggesting he put her clothing out the night before, when he got her ready for school.
Additionally, special needs children in our educational system here in P.E.I. have a communication book that goes home each day, to address day-to-day issues, such as change in schedules, or new tasks that have been mastered and even issues like those involving innapropriate dress. The persons involved in making this violating, undermining decision to call me this day, had every opportunity to dialogue with us during that time. I have a proven track record of being very approachable and have, thus far, communicated with decorum and humour.
That said, I was LIVID this day on the phone with this upstart of a woman who had the presumption to speak to me so insolently. I got to the point, exasperated as I was with her dogged determination to misunderstand our perspective and why and how it was so violating to have someone second guess one's parenting skills, without even having legitimate evidence to back oneself up in that department - Jeepers - I told her this conversation was over because I wanted to prevent myself from saying something that I would regret and then I hung up.
Two minutes later, after I had cooled down a wee bit, I called the school principal, to whom I rehearsed the contents of my earlier phone call, citing the impropriety of it to him. He, amazingly, defended his staff member. It took some pretty fast talking, legitimately so, to make a case for us in the face of what went down. Perhaps realizing he was dealing with someone with self confidence who wasn't ready to prostate herself before him, he finally conceded it wasn't right that the staff had not, at least, addressed what they saw as a "trend" (which was utter poppycock) in the first place by writing in the referred to communication book and agreed to speak to the staff member as well as others who were involved in the whole fiasco. I wasn't really satisfied but knew that was as good as it was gonna get, which doesn't speak well to his skills as a principal. How sad.
Just for the record, ironically, we had just given our daughter a whole new wardrobe for Christmas because, even without the school staff drawing it to my attention, I HAD noticed she had gone through a growth spurt over the previous months. I counted and she got, let's see, fourteen pairs of pants, about 11 shirts, several beautiful sweaters, 20-odd pairs of socks, two new pairs of winter boots, four pairs of PJs and several sets of hair accessories. Oh and a few new bras thrown in for good measure. I also went through her old things during the Christmas break and gave to charity anything that was too small....NOT that I aim to admit they MAY have had a case against us, but, as you, dear reader, do not KNOW our character or what kind of parents we are, you deserve to know the details to allow you to judge for yourselves.
The day I got the phonecall in question, was about three weeks after school had started up again. I mean, who was awake during those weeks and missed all these new things she was wearing?
And here is where it gets REALLY interesting.
About a half hour after I had the short but pointed talk with the principal, I got yet another phone call from the school. THIS time it was the school resource teacher and she was speaking as if I were made out of eggshells.  And she  proceeded to tell me our daughter was unwell and had to be picked up. I rolled my eyes.
I asked her how she knew our daughter was unwell enough to be picked up and she said she seemed hot. I asked her if she had taken her temperature and she got quiet for a second and then said, "no." But, just as quickly as it came out of her, she backed it up by saying she had touched her forehead and it was burning up.
Well, of course, like ANY good parent, NOW she had my full attention. But, knowing how teachers could be at times I proceeded to ask her if our daughter seemed lethargic. She said, "Oh yes, she can barely hold her head up."
I thought hard. It just seemed really suspicious, yet, I refuse to gamble where our daughter's health is concerned, when all is said and done. Because she had open heart surgery at ten weeks of age and, since then, I have, if anything, been hypervigilant about things like injury or sickness. I tend to be anal about it too, not giving in to pleas for sweets and junk food and making certain she is carefully bathed and warmly dressed come the hard P.E.I. wintertimes.
She must have sensed a weakness in me and added the clincher.
"I would want to know if MY little girl were sick."
You could almost hear the violins playing in the background.
Funny, I should have KNOWN something was up, given what had transpired earlier. But, like the responsible person I am, I wasn't willing to endanger my daughter's health over an issue of who was right or wrong and I arranged to have her picked up as soon as possible.
As soon as she got in the door, I ran to her and felt her forehead. It was as cool as a cucumber. Albeit her nose was running, but that was because she still did legitimately have a cold, of course. Which I had already known about. And which I knew, based on her behaviour, was on its way out.
So I got her layers of outside winter clothing off immediately and took her temperature three times.
Each reading said she was BELOW normal.
And I have to say, she really enjoyed her afternoon at home that day, playing around the house energetically and happily. To boot, she ate a full lunch and supper. I mean, come ON.
Incidentally, I called the school back right away and asked the resource teacher to call me back as soon as she had some free time. I left the message that our daughter was fine and did NOT, in actual fact, have a temperature. I even gave the readings - All three of them.
Suffice to say, she never called back.

Maher's Miserable Misogyny or How Stupid Can A Guy Get?

So the liberal, aetheists are at it again - giving Sarah Palin a hard time in the press. Predictable and slightly old, was my first response,when I read about what Bill Maher, a long time, well known cheerleader for that team, recently penned.
And then I stopped breathing for a second or two.
Let's start at the beginning. The article I read was actually quoting Bill Maher, in all fairness. But I assume the quote is accurate, having too been written by someone who is well known in journalistic circles.
Having determined the credibility of my source, I continued to read details. Surely, this well known writer wouldn't have said something that stupid, I thought.
But it turns out, he really did.
And this is what he said. He referred to Sarah Palin's family as a bunch  of "inbred weirdos".
Wow.
I understand what critics are getting at by suggesting Palin may be stretching the "Oh, poor me, I have a mentally handicapped child and therefore that qualifies me to be a compassionate, wise, elected official," schtick. Sure, I can buy that. Any thinking person could. But I draw the line there.
And I wonder what demon possessed Maher to commit professional suicide by saying such cruel, ignorant things. Things which showed how his own lack of intelligence.
Which is sort of ironic, when you really think about it, because Maher is also a well known advocate of aetheism, which is, of course, his legal and moral right - I have no beef with him having the right to freely express his opinions on things. After all, this is one of the most important foundations of these North American nations we have built, wouldn't you say?
I digress...
It's ironic because he does claim, like most critics of religion, in particular those who are suspicious of Christianity, to have a higher I.Q. than those who profess faith.
But this comment he made using the words "inbred weirdos" shows just how lacking in that area he is himself. That's where he most likely lost the respect and backing of other so-called intelligent, liberal-minded aetheists - I would sincerely hope that would be the case, anyway.
Do I need to explain this one, folks?
Well, in the event my thought process is not clear to some, I will paint the picture for you.
First of all, Down Syndrome - as most educated, intelligent people know; or should know - is not caused by "inbreeding", which refers to a penchant some cultures or isolated peoples have for marrying close relatives. It is caused by an error in cell division, which takes place almost immediately once an embryo has been fertilized. This causes a further error in one of the pairs of chromosones - the 21st pair, to be exact - which produces a spare chromosone. Hence the medical term for the syndrome is Trisomy 21.
OK, so we've established that fact. Strike one, Mr. Maher.
And here's where it gets even easier to see how he messed up.
Our thirteen year old daughter was born with Down Syndrome. She is the greatest thing that could have happened to our little family. She gives affection daily to all of us, without condition. She has taught us to see life and others with less judgement, more compassion and greater hope for our future. Essentially, she has taught us to be more emotionally mature than not having her would have accomplished.
Need I say it?  - Strike two.
Now in all fairness, Mr. Maher has not had a firsthand experience which compares to ours, so we really cannot judge him. Yet, he claims his intellect should somehow supercede the skills we have learned, by merit of our daughter's being born into our family, and that just doesn't ring true in my way of thinking.
And I know my own I.Q is just below genius. I learned that just before I wrote an LSAT exam when I was in my early 20s. So much for having the ability to process facts.
But, honestly? I did not learn anything useful until our daughter was born.THAT was when the real learning curve began.
So - the illusion that Mr. Maher has about those who have less intellectual ability being somehow less able to lead us or make sound judgements on behalf of large groups of people somehow just sounds rather hollow and without credence to me.
Perhaps I should invite Mr. Maher to come and stay with us for a while. Then he might - and I say that with hesitation because my feeling is he may well be closed minded about some things such as this - learn something that books and high I.Q.s just can't provide.
He might learn wisdom. Of which, at this point, it is evident, he has little.
Strike three.
It seems, Mr. Maher, you're out.

Pension Poop

WOW! I just read a story on Yahoo about an independent study done by a Toronto think tank on how Canada's Member of Parliament pension fund could possibly be at a deficit level of $1 Billion. The study cites figures given by the federal government describing how much is currently in that fund and claims it did the math on how much will actually be needed by the time the MPs, who are now in office, retire. The difference in those amounts is staggering, apparently. IF you can believe them.
The study concluded that one way to appease what may be irate pensioned elected officials, would be to give a major pay hike to them now, so they can put aside that money for the future against the so-called, bankrupted pension fund.
Du uh...
I wonder if the same folks who were in charge of this slick report were apprised of the fact that the federal civil servant pension fund has been pilfered by the feds for many years now and may well be rather extinct within just a few short years? I don't see anybody grieving that process or suggesting these people be given ridiculously high raises in pay to compensate for it.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
There have been at least two crown corporations that have been privatized, in an attempt to make for better administration and less waste of tax dollars. CRA, in particular, has come under the close scrutiny of the Treasury Department and has seen both a huge cut in union influence and what used to be reasonable pay hikes, to allow for cost of living rises. And, so far at least, most of the raises that are granted, come retroactively, when contracts have run out and negotiations run for months, sometimes years after. Add to that, once retroactive raises have been given, they sure haven`t included interest for the months when the recipients were without a contract.
Specifially, CRA's IT section has had pay raises reduced considerably. Most of the full time employees in that department simply are no longer even being paid market salaries for their programming skills and experience. And that was not always the case.
So when you marry that with the fact that their pension fund is in dire trouble, you get a group of very underpaid and underappreciated employees. Powerless employees, I might add.
Employees who see to it that our country's bureacracy runs smoothely in this era of sophisticated technology. Funny - I don't see any think tank doing an independent study on behalf of them.
While I realize this involves a completely different department, it does make me wonder why all those thousands of potential E.I. recipients are experiencing such frustratingly slow return times on their applications for benefits.
Guess that's what happens when we elect lawyers to run our country.