[History of England]

I've read Norman Davies The Isles and Oxford's History of Britain but they're both kind of heavy. If you have Audible (or check your library) there are two great courses I like, the first one covers Rome to Tudors the second covers Tudors to Stuarts. I haven't listened to the Stuart to Victoria one yet. Also check out Monarchy (2 seasons) on Netflix. For fiction Edward Rutherford has 3 books Sarum, London, and the Forest (he's also written a 2 book set on Ireland, one on New York and another on Russia). I own all of them and have read them several times. They are thick but worth it. There are tons of videos on YouTube that cover different parts of English history one of my favorites is The Worst Jobs in History series.

Thank you! :)

[History of England]

Someone gave me a copy of An Utterly Impartial History Of Britain by John O'Farrell. I can't recommend it because I haven't read it but my dd has been enjoying it. The little bit I have read is presented in a pretty humorous manner but it could be too British. Goodreads gives it mixed reviewshttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1935045.An_Utterly_Impartial_History_of_Britain_or_2000_Years_of_Upper_Class_Idiots_In_Charge.

Sounds fun! Thanks!

[History of England]

I bought Stobaugh's British History. It is short and to the point. I'm not sure how to recommend it. Did I like it? Yes. Did it do the job? Yes. But, the lessons were brief. England has such long, deep, rich, history. The text is about 250 pages. I did not purchase the teacher book. I wanted a supplement to our world history program. This book did quite well adding to an overall world history program.

Thanks, I'll look into it!

[History of England]

I'm looking for a good history of England (for myself, not my student). I've read a fair amount about the Tudors, because I find them fascinating for some reason, but I'd like to get a comprehensive overview of all of English history. I'm an American, and not exactly a history buff, so a beginner or introductory type work is perfect. I don't need this to be a scholarly tome. Something interesting and fun to read. I would also like for it to include information about the everyday lives of the common people and the culture, and not be just about the monarchs and the battles and the huge events.

 

Any suggestions for me?

[Prayer request My cousin just lost her 3 year old in her sleep. Update post #1]

I am so sorry. :grouphug:

[Summer: June 8-14]

Week 1 complete! Yay!

[Scary Feeling/Trusting your instincts]

I think 'gut' is over-rated. I don't get gut instincts ( in fact, this bugged me so much about first time motherhood - use your instincts - um, I don't have any) but I do have the cognitive ability to use common sense in most situations. For me, there is nothing intuitive about it - its a habitual learned cognitive process of being aware of what is going on around me.

 

In other words, being sensible.

 

I guess I'm not very sensible, then! :lol:

[Scary Feeling/Trusting your instincts]

I don't seem to have good instincts or a gut that conveys useful messages. I need help! I think I had the "be polite" message pounded into my head so much that it stamped out the survival instincts. And now I'm afraid that I may have unintentionally passed that along to my daughter.

 

Although, come to think of it, her instincts work better than mine. Once when we were at our usual grocery store, she said to me in a tone of voice that I knew was serious that we needed to hurry up with our shopping and get home. I asked her why, but she didn't want to say, so I just went on with the shopping, though I did try to hurry. I was vaguely aware of three young adults there who just somehow didn't fit, didn't seem like the usual customers. But I didn't think anything of it. Just before we got to the checkout, two of them went running out the door with carts full of liquor, and the third had pulled their car up to the front for a quick getaway. My daughter KNEW they were up to something the moment she laid eyes on them. They made her so uncomfortable she wanted to go home. She didn't tell me because, she explained later, everytime she tried to talk to me about it, one of them was nearby. I told her that if anything like that ever happens again, she can just tell me, "Mom we have to go home now" and we will go, no hesitation. My husband also really praised her for being aware and observant (he didn't add "while mom was oblivious" though he could have!). So I hope that was a good experience for her in that it taught her to trust her gut.

 

I just wish I could "fix" my broken gut!

[Scary Feeling/Trusting your instincts]

A week later, a mere week later, a vicious serial killer was caught in the next town over. This guy: David Parker Ray http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Parker_Ray (Careful, it's disturbing stuff. He would torture the victims. I think the wiki site is pretty tame, but some sites go into more details and it's disturbing.)

Wow, Garga, that is quite a story! I live in Albuquerque, and I remember that trial being all over the news for the longest time. I really made an effort *not* to keep up on the details, because even the few that I knew were horrifying beyond words. I am so glad that your mom is okay!

[Angry on so many levels about minor incident at the supermarket]

I already did

:001_smile:

You are so gracious! I know that I am supposed to pray for people who upset, hurt, or offend me. Sometimes, I first have to pray for the ability to pray for those people. :)

[Summer: June 8-14]

I just got back from the store. It turns out I have a Running Room close by and never knew it was there. It is funny what you don't notice if you aren't looking for it.

 

I need to stick with this now as I just bought a bunch of stuff! I went because I desperately needed shoes. Apparently I have some thing where my foot turns in (prolapse? something like that) and you can get shoes that compensate for it. They feel SO much better than my other shoes. And then the sales guy mentioned that the shoe company makes a matching wicking shirt. Obviously I needed that. Then I got running pants, running socks, and some belt thingy to hold my iPad. So I'm now in this 100%! I even got invited to a running group. I'll have to think about that -- at the moment I am enjoying my precious alone time.

 

Shopping spree -- how fun! I bought two new pairs of gym shorts for 8 bucks each at Target. :D No new shoes yet, though that's probably something I should think about before the actual 5K.

[getting back the discipline I have lost...can you help]

Tsuga, I am very sorry that my post was unhelpful, and even offensive. It wasn't my intention to accuse you of perfectionism at all. I was only sharing based on my experiences, and that may not be applicable or helpful to anyone else!

 

I also didn't mean to make it sound like "just give up because it isn't worth the fight." Some things absolutely ARE worth fighting for. You're right, I don't know your kids and I don't know your family dynamic. My repetoire of parenting skills is pretty limited, because it's been shaped by my interactions with my one, unique child, and she is exceptionally easy to parent. So in situations that are different from my own, I'm not in much of a position to help. So I sincerely apologize if my attempt to help had the opposite effect.

[Summer: June 8-14]

I made a conscious decision (not a mere procrastination) to do my third training run tomorrow. I did a 4-mile walk yesterday, and weights today, so I haven't been lazy (like usual!). But I'm still feeling jealous of all of you who get to say that you've completed Week 1! :lol:

[getting back the discipline I have lost...can you help]

I have a question.

 

Why bother teaching them to turn the lights off at all, if you give up when they are teens and it becomes a partnership in which I turn off all the lights?

 

What is the point? Or washing dishes. Or cleaning the room. If at some point I just stop and give up and say, this is my problem, then why did I bother for the 12 years leading up to it? They didn't learn and they won't learn. I'm the light lady, the toilet seat lady.

 

This is a serious question and not intended to sound snarky.

Jean and Creekland have already answered, and better than I could have, but I wanted to say that for me, a big part of this is not expecting perfection. I don't expect perfection from the adults in my life, including myself, so it would be really unfair to expect it of my teen. That doesn't mean I just give up completely and throw my hands in the air. It means I have to consciously and thoughtfully decide which issues are important enough to address and which ones I have to let go. (Obviously, that's going to look different in different families.) It also means addressing those issues in a way that is respectful to the child.

 

I hate to pick on my mom considering how far we have come and how much she has changed. But once when I was visiting home from college, after taking a shower, the towel racks were all full. So I hung my towel over the shower rod to dry. Awhile later, when I was chatting with my dad and brothers in the living room, she stormed into the room brandishing the towel and scolding me for hanging it in the wrong place. The precise placement of the towel was more important to her than the fact that her 19 year old daughter was visiting home for the first time in many months. I got the message loud and clear.

 

And that is a message that I do NOT want to send to my daughter! I want her to feel respected and appreciated. I do not want to nit-pick her to death and make her feel like she can't do anything right. I don't want to make her feel like things are more important to me than she is.

 

Now, my daughter hangs her towel in a place that I would not prefer that it be left. :lol: But you know what? It's hanging up. It's not going to get moldy and stinky, it's going to dry out. It's not hurting anything. So I'm not going to nag her about it, because I really have no right to demand that everyone in this house do things just precisely the way *I* want them done. Now if she were dumping her towel in a pile in the floor, that would be different. I'm not saying I don't have any standards at all. I'm just saying perfection is not the standard.

[getting back the discipline I have lost...can you help]

But I continue to ask cheerfully, ...

I think this is HUGE, and this was a big part of what I had in mind when I said that I try to treat my daughter like an adult. If I needed help from another adult, I wouldn't order, command, nag, or boss. I would ask. Politely. So that's what I do with my daughter too.

 

Also, I don't want to give any false impression about what I mean regarding treating her like an adult. We do have rules and limitations. I know my first responsibility is to be my daughter's parent and not her friend (though it's not an either/or proposition, and we are both!). The difference is in the approach though. With my mom it was a hierarchy; with my husband and daughter, we are a team. We don't just impose rules and punishments, we discuss our concerns and mutually agree on how to address them. I'm sure that eventually something is going to come up that we can't all agree on. I freely admit, I don't know exactly how we'll handle it. It hasn't been an issue yet.

["Why I Defaulted on My Student Loans" (article) -- cross-post]

I think what is never really discussed when it comes to art and creative careers and mostly left out of higher level art courses is that to make a decent living from any creative field talent is only one part of success, you also need to be a great business person. That doesn't generally come out of nowhere which is why I think there are so many starving artists . I did a creative degree and our business training was superficial at best and didn't extend much beyond designing a business card. There are ways to learn that side of it more easily now with companies like Creative Live teaching marketing and other skills. It makes sense to me that rather than telling our kids that they can't have professional careers as creatives I think we should be telling them to go ahead and hone their talents but do it alongside spending as much time learning business skills (even if they think it's boring and not what a creative person does).

Yes, some very good points. I have discussed with my daughter the possibility that she should pursue degrees in both art and business. I don't know if that's the best answer, but it is something to consider.

["Why I Defaulted on My Student Loans" (article) -- cross-post]

OK, I'll bite, but my comments are general, not specific to this person.

 

1. What is the good of a government that can't provide basic services like education ? And no, I don't buy that most people can make it without a tertiary education, not any more. It is immoral, imo, to profiteer on the backs of students. At some point, when do we all stop pointing the finger at individuals who don't play, and point it at the real problem, the system as is currently designed ?

 

2. Actually, life as a creative is really tough. Yeah, yeah, I know no-one wants to hear it. 90% of creatives do not make money from their primary art, and make a living from associated jobs, which keep them from making their primary art. It's soul destroying, and it's not merely a case of 'sucks to be you, if you were any good the market would support you'.

 

3. So what kind of world do we want ? One where education is a money spinner, that exacerbates class difference ? One where ''art' is just entertainment, blockbusters only please ? Or the only artists we have are the ones who can pay off debt ?

 

It's all about keeping elite choices for the elites. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.

 

I don't expect anyone to agree with me, and I don't plan on entering into an argument about it.

 

PS It's not a sign of moral character that you paid down your debt faster than the next person either...

No argument here. I don't disagree with any of this.

 

As the mother of a teen who desperately wants to make a career of her art, well the term "starving artist" is more than just an abstraction to me, I really worry about her future security.

 

As a "yellow dog Democrat" I also believe in the concept of the government making people's lives better. So I have NO objection, on principle, to the idea of more funding for post-secondary education. But - and this is a huge but - before I would advocate for more, there is a question I need answered.

 

College costs have been rising at a rate that's much faster than infalation. Several times that of inflation, right? So what I want to know is: where is that money going?? It sure as all heck isn't going to the faculty. When I attended college I was taught almost exclusively by tenured professors. Attending now, you're going to be taught by adjuncts who aren't even being paid a living wage. This absolutely infuriates me! At the same time that the cost of college is skyrocketing, the viability of teaching as a profession is plummeting. What the heck??? This absolutely reeks of corruption. Someone is getting rich off of others' poverty. So before I would advocate throwing more public money into a corrupt and broken system, I would want to fix the system. A pipe dream, I realize, but that's what I want. I want to find the leak and fix it first.

["Why I Defaulted on My Student Loans" (article) -- cross-post]

 

my particular usefulness to society.

 

If that article was indicative of his work, I think he may have overestimated his usefulness to society.

 

:lol: I mean that more light-heartedly than it probably sounds. I don't think that *I* am particularly useful to society either.

[Worst Carpool Experience Ever]

Here's what my elementary school bus driver did with his unruly students: He did not raise his voice. He just stopped the bus, turned it off, and didn't move until he got what he wanted. The more times he had to do this, the longer we sat each time. Took no time at all for us to figure out what his method was. Sitting by the side of the road for 1/2 hour should change their perspective.

I did this with a car full of Girl Scouts once. Works wonders.

[Summer: June 8-14]

I did my second one today! Yay!

Took my dog with me which made it a lot harder. He's a good walker when we go, but when I started running he thought we were going to go fast!! So he made me go faster than I wanted, But with the potty breaks and the sniff breaks and the pauses on the program from messing up my phone on the stops, it was all much harder and not nearly as enjoyable as the first day! Not sure if he gets to go again or not. :huh:

I did nothing on my day off. I really need to add on some strength training either after this or on the off days. But for now this is so much more than I was doing I need to be happy about that!

The first time I ran with my whippet, she went nuts. She starting jumping up and nipping me on the rear end! I'd shoo her away and tell her to knock it off, and a few seconds later, I'd feel another chomp on my butt! What the heck?!?

 

She did eventually calm down, but it was weird. And running with a dog is a lot more trouble. I should do it anyway, but haven't been so far this time.

[Summer: June 8-14]

Went kayaking this morning again, so I'm trying to decide if I want to do Day 2 today or not. Also, I fell (slipped getting back into my kayak after porting it a ways, and landed half in/half out) and have a ginormous bruise on my buttock that hurts when I walk. :crying: I need to suck it up.

Ouch! :( Sure hope you feel better quickly.

[getting back the discipline I have lost...can you help]

One thing though...If you continue trying to parent teens the exact same way that you parented them as tots and school aged kids, you are going to drive a wedge between yourself and your kids. It happened in my family and in my husband's family.

Yes. When I was 15, my mom was still talking to me the way she did when I was 5. Not only did this drive me crazy, it profoundly damaged our relationship. I avoided her whenever I could. I didn't want to be around her. I counted down the days until I could move away to college, and I visited home rarely after that. Things are better now, and I love my mom, but OP I know you deeply love your kids and you don't want this kind of dynamic! And I'm not saying that you have that. I'm just saying, I know you don't want to go there! :grouphug:

 

With my teen, obedience is not my goal. It's not even on my radar. I think of our relationship as more of a partnership now. It's no longer me directing and her following, like it was when she was little. It's working together to figure out where we want to go and how to get there. (I'm NOT saying I always succeed at this and I'm just such a fantastic parent. HA! I'm just saying that's my philosophy and my approach. I do fall short of my ideals. All the time.) My mom has explained to me that she felt desperate to protect and direct me, and she apparently didn't know how to do that except by controlling, bossing, and nagging me. I've tried to learn from her mistakes, and so my philosophy with my daughter is: "treat her like an adult, and she will act like an adult." She's my first and only, and the experiment is a work in progress, but so far it seems to be working out very nicely!

 

Yes, when she was little, I taught her to turn the lights off when she left a room. She generally remembers now, but when she doesn't, I just turn it off. Done. Same when my husband leaves his closet light on, which he does practically every day. I don't nag him about it, I just turn it off. If it were a chronic issue, I would take my daughter to Lowe's and buy some super energy-efficient bulbs for her bedroom and bathroom while chatting about the reasons for it, and that would be that.

 

If my daughter said she wanted to watch a movie right before dinner, I would respond the same way as if my husband said he was going to watch a movie right before dinner. "Okay, Sweetie, just be aware that dinner will be ready in five minutes." Then let her make the decision. If she wants to go to all the trouble of getting it started just to have to stop it right away, then let her. No harm done. If she'd rather watch the movie than eat, again same as for my husband, I let her make the decision. She almost always does eat dinner with us, but if she isn't hungry, I don't force it. She can warm up leftovers later if she wants to.

 

I do think the issue with your son wanting to help, and then ending up damaging things or possibly hurting someone - that's kind of in a different category. When safety is an issue, then you do have to be "bossy". I think this has already been suggested, but I would have a real heart to heart talk with him about it sometime when it is *not* happening, so that it's not an emtionally charged conversation. Let him know in advance than when you or your husband say "stop" you really need him to understand that it's for the safety of both the property and the people involved, and that you are confident that he can handle that responsibility like the capable young man that he is. He obviously wants very much to be seen as capable, and that's a good thing. He just needs a little more direction, maybe some more jobs and tasks that you know he can do well, or that challenge him just a bit (but not too much).

 

Well, I don't know if any of that will prove helpful at all, but :grouphug: OP. You're doing great, and your kids sound great - normal, and great! :D

[Summer: June 8-14]

Haha I actually already did it :) I mentioned to one of my friends (who is a marathon runner) that I was starting this yesterday and her first response was "what race are you doing?". There's a fun 5K at the beach in October so I went ahead and signed up. I think hubby is going to run the half. It will be a good goal, and it's far enough in the future that I have more than enough time to repeat some weeks if I need to.

Very cool! The run that I'm thinking about also has a 10K, so my husband is probably going to sign up for that. (He used to run marathons a lot, and though he doesn't run that far anymore, he could do a spontaneous 10K without even training. Must be nice! :) ) It will be nice to have him go there with me, for moral support. Our races will start 15 minutes apart, and he would leave me in the dust anyway, so he won't exactly be my running buddy. But it will still be nice to do it sort-of-together!

 

Running at the beach sounds really fun! I'll be running in dry, hot desert foothills at about a mile of elevation. Want to trade? :D

[Summer: June 8-14]

Just got back from my second training session. It was harder than the first! The humidity was higher today (unusually high for this area!), and I don't know if that's why, but breathing was a lot harder. I also twisted my ankle a little. It wasn't a big deal, and I was able to finish the run. But my worry is that it's one of those things where the pain will get worse over the course of the upcoming hours or days. I certainly hope that won't be the case. I can always postpone my planned Friday run until Saturday if that would help. But I sure don't want to have to delay more than that! Well, we'll see how it goes.

 

It was more humid here because we'd had a nice rain just before dawn. It was still cloudy (and that's unual here too!) and cooler than usual, so that aspect of the run was really very nice. That's kind of a rare and precious thing here in the desert.

[S/O Diabetes threads-getting a diagnosis]

Almost forgot, you'll also need this: http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14046889.php