WalMart, Smoking and the Fancy-Schmancy Wipe-Your-Nose, Wipe-Your-Ass Calculator

I have a few topics that I feel the need to rant about so bear with me...


First, what is wrong with people that they feel the need to take their small children to WalMart at 1AM!! Sam and I had to go on a plastic Easter egg hunt of our very own the other night. (Andy couldn't find their eggs.) So, after we got the kids to bed and I finished scrubbing my kitchen floor, we headed to WalMart. (Leaving Andy with Kieren and Cullen and Mark with Ian. Imagine that!!) We saw several small children while in the store. At check out, the 3 people in front of us had a 4-6 month old who was asleep in a stroller. At the jewelry counter, a couple had a 2-3 year old toddler who was rubbing his eyes furiously. While leaving the store, we saw a couple with 3 children all under the age of 6. And, we saw a couple carrying a sleeping child into the store that could not have been older than 1.


Remember this was at 1AM folks!! Please note that all of these children were accompanied by more than one adult. Has anyone every heard of having one person stay home with the sleeping child while the other runs errands?!?! The only reason I can think of for taking a child out that late would be a trip to the hospital because they are too sick to make it to the morning. I simply can't think of any reason whatsoever that a person would take a child out that late at night to a store!!!


Now for some editorial commentary: And, I am sure that these are the same people that will have discipline problems, health issues and school/learning problems with their children later. I think most responsible parents understand the need for structure, bed times, etc. so that their children know what to expect and therefore, grow up to be productive members of society. It irritates the hell out of me to see the parents we saw at WalMart knowing that the rest of us taxpayers will have the golden opportunity to pay for programs to assist their children and them with their ignorance! I completely agree and understand the need for such government assisted programs and there are many children that legitimately need them (such as Kieren and her speech therapy), but I fail to see the reason the rest of us should support parents who are too stupid to realize the problems they can cause by taking their child out to a store at 1AM.



As for rant number 2: The other day I was talking on the phone with my friend, Jenn, while sitting in my car in the parking lot of Meijer's. I watched a woman put a small child (in a pumpkin seat) in the back of her car, then she and her mother got in the car. Immediately upon sitting down, both women lit a cigarette!!! What is wrong with people!?!?! How many kids need to die, how many children need to be sickly their entire lives, how many commercials, stories, news programs do people need to see before they realize the idiocy of this action?! That child has no choice but to breathe in the cancer causing agents both his/her grandmother and mother are emitting.



Now, I admit that Mark is a smoker for those of you that don't know that. But, he NEVER smokes in the car or our home. He smokes outside. He comes in the house afterward, uses the Febreeze and washes his hands before coming near anyone or anything. Do I like that he smokes, HELL NO! But, at least Ian, Alex and I don't have to smell it or worse yet, be trapped with it in the car!!


It was all I could do not to get out of my car and yank both of them out of their car!

Rant #3: The Fancy-Schmancy-Wipe-Your-Nose, Wipe-Your-Ass Calculator. Over the past week or two, Alex and I have done quite a bit of make-up school work. (Because he decided that he really didn't need to do it when it was due!!! But, that's a whole other rant!!) Anyway, a good portion of the work was math. I am about as frustrated as any human can be about the Math program used by our school district. If your public school district (and most of them do) uses "Everyday Math", you need to run the other direction. Did you know that your children are no longer required to memorize their multiplication tables? Did you know that they are no longer taught to 'borrow and carry' when subtracting? Did you know that they are no longer taught words like subtract, add and multiply? That's just a sample of the problems, you really don't want to listen to me go off about all of them. So, I will confine this rant to the calculator.

Since 5th grade, Alex has been required to have the "Calculator". It's the one I call the Fancy-Schmancy-Wipe-Your-Nose, Wipe-Your-Ass-Calculator. Why do I call it that? Well, because you enter in the entire equation including all functions, parentheses, etc., make corrections like a computer, and hit enter. It gives you the answer so that you never have to bother to learn in what order you need to perform the functions of your equation. So, when given a problem like: 9+8(3X12), you don't have to know what to do first. (Took some of you all the way back to elementary school with that, didn't I!?!) Heaven forbid, we should teach our children to actually think!

Not only that, but why would we need to memorize our multiplication tables when we have the "Calculator"? The child (in 7th grade) can't multiply 72X48 without the "Calculator"!!!! He even had trouble with that problem when given my basic calculator to use because it didn't have all the fancy-schmancy keys and an "enter" button!! For that matter, he can't tell you what 8X9 is without the "Calculator". I did not regularly use a calculator until high school when I finally got to Trig. class. Why does a child in the 5th grade need one? At that level, the math they are doing can easily be worked out on a piece of paper. It may take a little longer, but they might actually learn something. I guarantee at the present rate, Alex will leave school and will no know how to complete a basic math problem without a calculator. You know the problems I am talking about: 20% off the already reduced sale price, which cereal is a better buy, etc. Should be fun to have to constantly walk thru life with the "Calculator" so that you can merely function like the rest of us!!!

Further, we can't 'force' our children to memorize our multiplication tables because the way we were taught was 'cruel'. In other words, all those games we played where our team got a point for each right answer are just wrong. Why you ask? Because some of the children actually "lose" at that game. Exactly what coping skills are we teaching our children if we teach them that they will always win? I'm sorry, but sometimes you are going to lose no matter what effort you give it. That's a fact of life. I learned it early and it hasn't caused me significant psychological distress. I applaud giving children credit for the effort they give to a project or team, but when did we decide that there are no losers in this world?

Okay, I'm getting off my soapbox for now. I've got a few more about things like racism and help around the house, (Wow, those are pretty diverse aren't they?!?) but those will wait for another day. I am off to download some of the cutest Easter pictures ever!!