My brother is similar. He would sent me his medical stuff since we are in different countries. I’ll just point out the important stuff and leave out the not so critical ones so as not to overwhelm him. My late mom was a nurse. However, she felt I have more experience being a patient because I was sickly all my life. When I went with her and I feel a lack of info, I would let my mom know and she would decide whether to ask or we would go home and dig out the info e.g. drug allergies and drug interactions. When my husband accompanies me to my appointments, he will advocate. Main reason being I am a night person and while my listening brain is still sharp enough in the day time, my asking brain is in passive mode.

I find getting insoles that help is easier than finding dressy flats with adequate support. I have high arches and with age they aren’t as high anymore. Ecco, Clarks have dress shoes that have better support.

This. My cousins who are fraternal twins don’t even get along well because of the male cousin’s selfish personality. One of my aunt has four children with age gap of 2,2,2,5. The oldest don’t get along with the second and third because of personality clashes. The youngest is an extrovert and has been happily working in a sales related job for decades. I get along with all four in different ways, the relationship with my female cousin who is 8 years older is like a tacit understanding. My brother is 9 years younger so it was more of a big sister role.

@MEmama I have two aloe vera plants. I use the sap more for scalds (arm accidentally touching a hot pot) than sunburns.

@MEmama I can get sunburn even at Lake Tahoe when there is no cloud cover. Sprouts supermarket here sell aloe leaves. I don’t know how effective aloe gel would be.

Do you happen to have aloe? The sap is rather effective for sunburns

@Eos@ScoutTN in many college Reddit threads, students mentioned being lonely, isolated and looking for people to hang out. DS19 is an introvert and having random people to play tennis with and a chess club to go to more than fulfill his social needs quota. I am an extrovert and was partying almost every Friday and Saturday evening. The “going to bars” group I hang out with have teetotalers and light drinkers but the places we went were on the expensive side, close to $20 a drink. So if your daughters’ roommates are hanging out with people who are heavy drinkers and go to places where a pour during happy hour is rather economical, they are going to get drunk real fast and their drinking companions aren’t going to tell them to stop. Alcohol and drugs on campus is something that the staff would turn a blind eye to because how many misdemeanors are they going to give out and what corrective action is the college supposed to dole out. For example for someone smoking a cigarette on campus, does the person gets a misdemeanor on his/her record that gets erased/purged if the person attends a number of smoking cessation clinic sessions? Your daughters’ roommates are lucky to have them calling medical services on their behalf since alcohol overdose can be fatal. I agree it is traumatizing though. When my engineering schoolmates saw how drunk some people were at post exams celebrations, they were even more overprotective to their female engineering schoolmates.

@Eos My country of origin legal drinking age is 18. I’m not even pretty but people (including acquaintances) would still buy me drinks when I was in college. Makes me wonder if your daughter’s roommate is so drunk because she is very social and people are plying her with drinks. I do know people who sent their kids to college just to get that paper qualification. I also know people who sent their kids to college to see if their kids want to migrate/relocate there.

Does she have a shredder/food processor? If she does, she can shred cabbage (or any vegetable) and use it to line the plate, then put the chicken nuggets (or meatballs or any other meat) on top. It also makes clean up easier because whatever “oil drippings” from the meat gets mostly absorb by the vegetables. I usually run my food processor when I bulk buy cabbage and carrots, then just portion and pack them into ziploc. I often buy six heads of cabbage when they go on sale and the Costco pack of carrots to me is huge.

Don’t think so. My county health service would announce on social media way before hospital capacity is near full. There are frequent reminders about RSV though.

I agree. However, if the janitor has to come early just to open up the venue for my event or stay late to close up, I would want to give a tip as appreciation. I have met many janitors who were kind enough not to rush us as everyone is helping to clean up the area. I have also encountered janitors who gave us a sulky look even before the event time is up.

I was thinking that for weekends, yogurt parfait is something that her children can easily DIY with her for breakfast. When we forget to buy fruits, our parfait is just granola and low fat or greek yogurt (whichever happens to be on sale). For simple cut fruits, just slice a banana. When blueberries are on seasonal sale, they are great for parfait.

Rice and spaghetti are non perishables 🙂 Besides non-perishables in general are great for power outages and natural disasters.

I would give a small tip to the janitor who has to unlock the venue and lock up after.

Does she have EBT? I would go to Walmart or Kroger monthly or biweekly and stock up on vegetables and meat. Is her fridge big enough to hold two weeks worth of food? How old is her oldest child? When I wanted to save money but too tired to do food prep, my kids when they were much younger would help with cutting carrots and slicing onions. They used a steak knife to cut and just cut thick slices, good enough for me. We would buy seasonal vegetables because they were much cheaper and my kids would help chop them up and dump the chop pieces into ziplocs.

I would bulk buy frozen vegetables, prepacked meat and invest in an instant pot, Then start with one pot meals so that she only need to wash that one pot and plates/bowls. Time is a factor until she is "efficient" at cooking.

I don't remember needing those but I am old school and can just calculate since the formula is provided in the exam. My kids are used to learning to do everything using a scientific calculator in case their TI84 battery is flat. The only exam that "need" a graphing calculator was the AP Calculus exam because there is usually a question or two that requires that and my kids wanted that 5 so every point feels important to them. Take a look at the 2023 FRQ and sample answers https://apcentral.collegeboard.org/courses/ap-statistics/exam/past-exam-questions

I would pick frozen chicken nuggets, ravioli and gyoza which is probably closest to choice 3 if I have a time crunch but don't need to be penny pinching. When I am sick, it is still possible to buy the least bad choice from the frozen aisles at supermarkets. I have frozen wontons from Costco currently as time crunch backup food. I often have Trader Joe's gyoza in my freezer as backup. I think I would start with getting used to reading ingredients list on everything including sauces (and mayonaise) and making a list of convenient store bought food that is relatively safe to eat in a time crunch or when sick. When I am feeling weird while out running errands, a $1 pack of shelled pistachios from Walgreens help. Might not be the healthiest option but it works as a stop gap when the alternative is either a gastric attack or dizzy spell. Also, in a power outage, I would consider bread and canned tuna or salmon as real food. Two common dishes that are fail proof to me for people starting cook are fried rice and stir fry vegetables (with or without meat). Stir fry to me is basically salvage whatever is in the fridge and fry. Fried rice is kind of like stir fry to me, just with rice and eggs added.

For the frappucino option, I can choose almond milk or soy milk and no whipped cream.

A normal scientific calculator which typically has stats functions is all that is needed. Basically a calculator that cost less than $20 and would be a good backup calculator for college. My kids used a solar power Casio scientific calculator for AP Stats.

I have the app because it is so much easier to order a customize drink than worrying if the barista hears my order wrongly. I typically order for my teens and I so it is easier to not order wrongly on the app. Besides, I order when I am about 5 to 10mins away from a Starbucks so when I reach, I can just go in and grab my mobile order. My teens would opt for mocha frappuccino with lots of whipped cream and chocolate chips.

I end up giving to a homeschooling friend. I would sell as a lot unless you are doing a yard sale style selling. It is very hard to sell (or give away) bit by bit. My friend most wanted my retort stand because it is tried and tested so she “booked” that for when my kids were done with it.

@Pawz4me regular coffee might mean with sugar and creamer. If it is a cafe and I see sugar and creamer packs on the side wall, I would just say regular coffee. If I don’t see sugar or coffee packets, I’ll ask for coffee black and sugar on the side in case it is too bitter. If it is a family business cafe, I would ask for coffee strong because I don’t want an espresso shot but I do want a stronger/thicker brew of coffee black.

"The core assessments are standard paper/pencil exams. For majority of courses, these exams take 3 hours. The exams need to be independently proctored to receive a letter grade. (If a relative proctors the exam, the course will be graded on a credit/no-credit basis.) Students should arrange with their school, local library, testing or tutoring center etc. to obtain an appropriate independent proctor to be registered into University-Level Online’s system." https://ulo.stanford.edu/how-our-courses-function-ulo

DS19 took two math class and one physics class but that was way back in 2018, so things probably have changed since then. The exams were proctored and we used SJSU's testing services as that was the nearest place for us that offered proctor services for SPCS.