It will be a very confusing find for a future space traveler.

This is the same response my DH had when I told him. "Well, we've crapped all over earth, why not the moon!"

I'm never going to be able to look at the moon the same way again. Every time I look at a full moon, I'm going to think 🌑💩

I feel like every school I've heard of is labeled a "party school" 😂 Except the university in town. This is the quietest campus I've ever been on. No music thumping from the dorms, no one outside talking. It's kind of weird.

Yes, I agree that there is a difference between education and having a degree. There are a lot of really interesting things to learn about the world and a lot of it can be learned for free. Like my friend getting a degree in Women's Studies in the hopes of it leading to a job. I really hope she can find one, but yeesh. If I was struggling financially and trying to boost my employment options in my 40s, this is not the degree I'd choose. I'd simply study on the topic to my heart's content and go get a degree in accounting or cybersecurity or anything else!

I left the group when the admin and others doubled down on why the question was ok, and how it was no one's business and didn't affect us. Nope nope nope.

Thought if this thread today when someone in a FB group asked for a flat-earth curriculum. 🙄😔🌍🫨

Agreed, if my kid gets a scholarship that pays for campus living and he wants to go, then sure. But I am not going into debt for it, nor am I willing to work myself to death so he can have the experience. And I am going to argue strongly against him taking out loans to live in campus. At the places we are exploring, (state schools), tuition is affordable but room and board is where they make their money.

My relative is still paying off student loans at age 45. Someone convinced them that a tier 4 law degree was a good idea, on top of the undergrad and grad school degrees/debt. Plus, all the school debt their spouse has. They will never, ever get out of from under this. I have a friend that is doggedly pursuing a Women's Studies degree and is POSITIVE this will land her a good paying job; student loan debt be damned. I have another friend that was an engineering major in school. Three years' worth of school loans, flunked out because the work was over her head, and now manages a McDonalds. Maybe if she went part time she could have gotten through the program, I don't know. Then again, she was an engineering major at a school known for fine arts, so... These are the "Don't Let This Happen to You" stories I tell my son. Yes, you can have a college education if you want one. But you have to think carefully about the cost of it and the cost of all the other things you want in life. A degree is not a guaranteed paycheck and a certain standard of living. We will have to be creative and resourceful if college is the plan: part time, CLEP exams, living at home, gen eds through the cheaper community college, gap year to work and save, some combination of all of those. Yes, there are good freshman scholarships available for full time enrollment, but the places we've looked into require living on campus and the scholarships are not enough money to completely cover the expense of room and board.

I'm feeling really curmudgeony about this tonight. Come with me on a trip to "back in my day..." My parents and stepparents all lived at home and attended local colleges. Same for my aunts and uncles. There is only one aunt that had the "full college experience" and went out of state, (on a full ride). Everyone lived at home until they got married or were established long enough in jobs that they could afford to move out. My older cousins had the same experience. One briefly lived on campus until lousy grades brought him home. My grandparents did not attend college, but all lived at home until they were married. They were blue collar union carpenters, postal workers, school secretaries. My stepfather's parents attended college, and they were considered to be wealthy people. I would have happily attended a local school and lived at home, but "family dynamics" 🙄 demanded I attend school 500 miles away. Sometime in my generation, the expectation shifted to "full college experience" at a faraway school: dorms, dining halls, football stadiums, college life, Greek life, rah rah sis boom bah. That stuff was always there for wealthier people, but it became expected of "good" middle class families, too. Then college costs exploded: inflation plus easier access to loans plus all the marketing and rhetoric about college is a must and you don't want your children to be left behind in the new millenium, do you? And because the middle class is aspirational, an average college dorm experience is not good enough anymore. Doesn't your child deserve the very best? Don't they deserve gourmet coffee in the student lounge? Award winning landscaping? Olympic pools and racquetball? Hot stone massage, nutrition counseling, reiki energy treatments? (Those are services offered at a state flagship state school!) Is this the full college experience people now require? This is nuts. No wonder the students at my alma mater think they place is a dump when other students get herbal tea and relaxing massages during finals week. We have lost the plot.

The article is paywalled for me, so my comments are based on what I see and hear around me, and not the article. When tuition at the local school is $40k a year and starting salary for jobs that my interest my kid is $40k a year, yes, I question what the heck we're doing and whether or not attending college is worth it. When AI is projected to take away a lot of those jobs, yes, I question whether or not the expense of college is worth it. Maybe he's better off at the $16k, 18month trade school. His starting salary will still be $40k but he will graduate with no debt. So, 0 debt and $40K a year vs $160K debt + compounding interest and $40K a year. It's really hard to get a jump start on life with debt. He doesn't have to be a tradesman forever. Start in a trade, live rent-free at home with us, and save your paycheck for later so you can: buy a car, buy a house, pay for the next career path.

High Point U's steak house sounds like finishing school. And the steakhouse is included in the meal plan. On their website, they market themselves as "The Premier Lifeskills University". I don't even know what to make of that. $47K a year tuition and $19K a year in room and board for a triple so your kid can learn etiquette and how to make reservations at fancy restaurants and appreciate global cuisine? Come on...this is nonsense. The school with the lazy river: the student activities fee might pay for the upkeep on this thing, but where did the money come from for it to be built? Tuition? Room and board? Is this a state school that sent tax money to fund it? The activities fee is a drop in the bucket but there are a lot of drops filling that bucket to the brim. (Room, board, tuition, chromebooks, e-textbook fees, fees to park on campus, health center fees, technology fees, science lab fees, and on and on and on). Someone paid for the infrastructure to start with. I get that everyone wants their kid to have a really nice life and look back fondly on their university years. But there's a cost to all this nonsense. People are taking out loans for this and it's unsustainable. We see all around us how unsustainable all of this is, and yet no one wants to budge and say, "Maybe we need to adjust expectations". I was dazzled by college catalogues showcasing fun and fancy amenities until my parents said "Look, we're not paying for breakfast to be delivered to your room every morning. It's a small campus; ride your bike to the dining hall before class. We are not paying for drop off laundry service. Here's a roll of quarters; do your own laundry". Do we want to pay good quality professors or do we want to finance concierge breakfast and laundry service over 30 years? College is a short period of time, but the debt hangs on forever.

Yes, this! I looked at my alma mater to see what has changed since I left, and boy is it nice now. I mean, really nice! They have 1500 fewer students than when I was there, but 3 additional dining halls and new, townhouse style apartments. They also put in a bazillion dollar pool and science center. They have cafes in every academic building now and a campus Starbucks and Tim Hortons. This is a fine arts school. It is never, ever going to be a player in collegiate sports so why spend that kind of money on a nice-to-have pool with Olympic diving boards? A beautiful but underutilized science center? I'm glad students have fresh salads readily available for lunches, but does every building need its own cafe? Admin knew that attendance was projected to drop but they put in fancy apartments anyway. And the students still complain the food sucks, the dorms are dumpy, and there's nothing to do. I don't get it. Now the school is running a deficit and I'm a little worried it's entering a death spiral. My rant aside, this was.a lot of money foolishly spent that is now passed on to the students and parents via room, board, activities fees. They added a lot of fancy stuff to try to be all things to all people instead of investing in what the are known for and it may be the death of the school.

We had to do gymnastics, too. Some of it was ok and safe, but there was one thing where the teacher wanted us to jump off this spring board thing, catapult over a wall of mats, and then land our hands and roll into a summersault. It seemed like the best way to break your neck AND your wrists. I refused and boy, was the teacher p.o.ed at me.

That's because obesity isn't caused by sedentary behavior. It's because of the ultra-high processed foods we eat. It's really, really hard to exercise weight off. I hated gym class because it was all about tEaM SpOrTz being the only thing worthwhile. There was one year the gym teachers offered a program focused on the sort of exercise people did as adults: biking, walking, hiking, weights, aerobics. It was the best time I had in gym ever, but the program was cancelled because the insurance company didn't like all those kids going off campus all the time.

Anecdata report: Lots of OTC covid tests available everywhere I go in my local area. When there is an uptick in respiratory stuff, covid tests disappear for a few weeks. But shelves are currently full of tests.

Wow, I'm not sure I even knew that could happen. I'm glad he's recovering. Do doctors/scientists understand how the vax could attack the spinal column?

It's just anecdata, but I know of several people with cardiac issues after contracting covid. One person was 60s, obese, and already had significant health issues that covid made worse. I don't know of anyone that had long term issues post vax. I know a few people that felt kind of dumpy for a week after vax, but nothing serious.

I used a bassinet until DS outgrew it. It had wheels on the legs so I could easily move it around, plus a storage basket underneath for diapers, wipes, extra bedding and sleepers. I liked the bassinet because I'd had a c-section and needed to sleep semi upright on the sofa for a while, and I wanted to keep the baby near me. We had a crib set up, (a giant wooden thing), but with my short height and the c section, it would have been hard to get baby DS in and out. FYI, I discovered that standard pillowcases fit the little bassinet mattress, so I didn't need to buy lots of expensive bassinet sheets. I just popped pillowcases on and off when the sheets were in the wash.

No big plans or changes, knock wood. I feel like we hemorrhage money at the grocery store. If we stick to fresh, made from scratch foods, the budget is fine. We don't eat a lot of processed food, but the few items we do buy are outrageously expensive now. $5.70 for a bottle of mayo?! (That same mayo was $3.88 2 years ago) $4 for a stupid box of crackers?! Nearly $5 for Kings Hawaiian rolls?! We can afford those prices, but I don't really want to spend that. So, I guess my project for September is to get really good at making those things from scratch. It's healthier, anyway. In positive news, there was an end-cap of eggs marked down to 71 cents a dozen. I bought 4 dozen and baked a bunch of things to freeze. DS announced out of the blue that he'd like to study physics this year. The Thrift Gods smiled on me and the very next day, I found a College Physics textbook at Goodwill. The openstax lab book will work fine with the textbook; we have almost everything we need for labs. We'll use online labs for the 2 or 3 in the manual the require fancy equipment.

My paternal grandma was not a good cook, but she was a good artist. My maternal grandma was a decent cook, but better at crochet. When she was younger, she would add these delicate borders to her hankies and scarves. She made blankets for me, my kindergarten teacher, my half-sister (who wasn't even related to my grandma), toys for me and my half-sister. I have her set tiny steel crochet hooks plus her regular hooks. I have a few of the crochet lace doilies she made, too.

Rubbing alcohol with take some of it off, but also dry your hands out. It won't last for weeks; the dye has only penetrated the outer layer of skin. You wash your hands frequently, so they're always sloughing off skin cells. I bet it will be gone within the week.

Oh, I'm wrong. The cool robotics and art programs are in a different, wealthier district. The district with the gun on the bus has $40 a week afterschool care program for K-5. Includes snack, homework help, "group activities", movies, and "fun!" It's probably a bunch of kids piled into the gym with a tv going in one corner, loud music in another corner, and a bunch of kids going bonkers from the noise and stimulation. But that's what you get for $2-3 bucks an hour.

Quality varies, like most things. Honestly, after a long day of school and precious little recess, I think free play outside would be great. Childhood is very structured, scheduled, and monetized now.

Yes, they then are in paid after school care. There are a lot of businesses that cater to this. They come in to the school and offer art lessons, robotics, all sorts of things for after school care, but for a fee. In some places, that is the only music or art exposure the kids will have because there are no art or music teachers at the school anymore. There is a daycare here that has bus service to and from school and is open 5 am - 12 am. 😔 I have no idea what the families that can't afford after care do.