Male HL employees will probably still have Viagra covered, because while God abhores fertility control, he grants His holy pity and grace upon the male of his flock with broken hydraulics. But seriously, if HL is incorporated, and not as a subchapter S, there are legal separations between the owners and the business, so the whole idea of an owner's beliefs mingling with corporate law seems a big shaky from the start. Granted, SCOTUS might still do many contoftions to get around that.

One more reason I tell every parent/patient I meet to make friends with the child life specialist at his/her local cancer center. Most don't. DD is mg, and has more than her share of a psychological load to deal with, and yes, I do think giftedness makes that load heavier. It's something we actively manage, with help. Any article that makes me think I'm not crazy and alone is a good article. Thanks.

I'm convinced it's a gifted thing with DD13. She can be pretty neat on a zaner bloser printout, but once she picks up speed and is in the flow of the work on, say an essay, she she reverts back to doctor's prescription quasi Latin. It has to be a processing speed thing, and the hand just can't keep up. At least that's what I tell myself.

That old "walked into the door again" thing, right? Wasn't there an 80's song about child abuse that used that line? The tapdancing around calling abuse abuse is stunning.

Purple tentacles. I have not investigated further.

Which layer?

We still have a Fisher Price alphabet,vintage 2001, magnets from vacas, photo magnets from,about the last 4 years,of dancing,school, and an assortment of hs or ps-related snarky cartoons. It's the top of the fridge that's the real archeological expedition, but I couldn't post an inventory without having it right in front of me.

It's technically light "leaking " around your retina. Mine looked like white jelly beans that would scoot across the very top of my field of vision at random intervals. I would expect others to see diffdrent intensities and locations based on their particular detachment.

I had a detached retina 5 yeas ago -- symptoms were little flashy jellybeans near the periphery. What detached the retina was an ocular melanoma tumor, so not to be Dr. Doom here, but do not wait to see an ophthalmologist and/or retina specialist. This week would be good. Today even better.

Lol. To think of all the times DD and I have buzzed in to DW's school and walked right to her room. Still do. Only once did a new superintendent stop me. I think they have a training contract with the TSA. And yeah, we do have 2 HS converts among the faculty so far. Watch for that tide to rise as PARCC gets rolling.

I know that look! It's like they're in a re-boot cycle and you have to just wait for the Windows login screen to appear again. :laugh:

Thanks. I do admit to having evil daydreams that follow a certain theme, and involve DD, maybe 20 years hence, saying to her significant other something like "Whadayamean you can't sew on a button? My DAD could do that!" Patrick Stewart was asked in an old interview why in the world would there be a bald character in the distant future. Certainly by that time, we will have found a cure. Sir Stewart's reply -- "No, certainly by that time, no one will care." 'Nuff said.

Thank you for this. My guess is that it takes a somewhat advanced level of extroversion and confidence to be the SAHD that can maintain a network of accepting friends. I am not that guy, but then, I never was. So is my career perfect for the introverted dad? Perhaps. Compared to the hyper-networked back-slappers I used to see on the NYC train, yeah. But I'm in a demographic bubble of a town. I've heard the lucky thing, or its variants : "Oh, I could never do that," and my fav, "But you only have one kid." The best is when someone assumes DW teaches middle school fulltime AND homeschools DD every day. You can see the gears spinning before they ask "how does that work?"

You beat me to it. However, I will add to your reply with a genuine question for the previous post. How do you differentiate stress in some measurable way? I'm sure there's a way - measuring cortisol levels and whatnot. How would we compare stress from parenting small kids to stress of....let me pick the most macho thing I can....armed combat. No, how about carrier landings. Working a trading floor? Well, shoot. Women now do those jobs too. If there's genuine imperical data showing men just can't handle that certain little kid stress, I'm listening. If true, then we do need to socialize boys differently, if only for, their own health! Of course, I am indeed calling BS on the premise, but I could be swayed by real research.

That was my takeaway as well. A society will change, in part, brcause of what it values, and values have always changed over time. One scary experiment going on now is our increasing tribalism, which, I would think, is counterproductive to developing cohesive, large scale values strong enough to prompt change.

Indeed. One tidbit near the end echoed a main point in the TED vid: "we might break the spurious link between our critique of the family wage and flexible capitalism by militating for a form of life that de-centres waged work and valorises unwaged activities, including – but not only – carework" I was struck by the idea of societal importance, or what value a people puts on an occupation. I don't know just how you get a population to value the home parent's work as much as that of the salaried parent, but once again, we'd have to ask Finland.

Nifty. You'll get 300k miles out of it.

Yes, there are genuine biological realities I can not match. Yet I was home with DD at 4 months, so how might you measure the amount of disruption to the maternal relationship? How might it be measured with two gay men and an adopted infant?

And she makes that point in the vid. Unitl the professions are looked at more equally, the perceptions won't change. The same argument can be used for the high perceptions of Finland's teachers.

In the TED vid, the speaker is coming from a rarefied world - DC job, house in Princeton. Maybe not the fabled 1%, but prob the 10%. The alpha males in her circle do take the their gender roles to the max, me thinks, and in that circle, I could see little motivation for change. More hopful was the quip about employers in (Finland?) looking askance at male applicants who did not take their alloted family leave. That speaks of positive culture shift....over there. The flip side, here's the American dad, brought to you by Cadillac: http://youtu.be/qGJSI48gkFc

While I can see a thread of logic in some of what you've said, the idea that society has pushed men to be breadwinners so women don't have to seem historically questionable, at best. What is you evidence that society has pushed men to be breadwinners as a favor to women? While we'e at it, which society -- American, Asian, 18th century Britain? As far as women having a genetic predisposition for child care, how might you square that with the 1740 cases of filicide each year (source NCANDS 2008). Are these genetic, rather than psycho/social anomalies? As for pushing people to delay fulfilling sexual desires, do you mean Planned Parenthood, you know with all those picket signs out front (granted the three people outside my local branch look like they could a tiff drink and a place to sit). Is this push of which you speak universal, and how's it going in the inner city? I always like to read original data, geek that I am, so please post those links if you got 'em!

If it is genetic, how would that account for the Scandinavian differences cited by the TED speaker?

Another vote for BBC Dance Mat.

I thought this was rather good, especially stating around the 11 minute mark. I'm not holding my breath for any massive societal shifts, at least not here, but she makes valid points. http://youtu.be/tH5iEf9oxaI Edit -- even though I embed video that same way each time, it's a coin flip if it works.

To give DD a leg up in identifying new words she encounters. That's it. We have grammar very well covered elsewhere. Now, the wordier rationale includes looking at language as dynamic playdoh, and building skills to tinker, fiddle, and tear it apart. Unless they're in AP Lang, my SAT kids can't do that.