A guinea pig — or even a betta — makes a better first pet than a puppy.

Hmm. Interesting. I had hamsters when I was growing up. Never actually thought of a guinea pig for our daughter but maybe it’s not a bad idea.

What do you think?

Today, upon picking up my child from daycare, I noticed her suddenly standing still, frowning, and suppressing a cry. I turned around to see a woman walking away from my child, lugging an infant in a car carrier. I asked my little girl, “Did that lady hit you with the car seat?” and my daughter nodded and started to cry. The woman heard me asking my girl and stopped, turned and shouted at me from the end of the hall, “I didn’t hit her! She walked into me!” I turned back to my little girl and asked if she was ok and where she was hit. As my daughter showed me her hip, with a slight red mark and a scratch, the woman shouted again, “She walked into me!” to which I replied, “Nice of you to make sure she was ok!” (which she is).

a) I was right beside my child as you passed by us – she did not waver from my side.

b) You clueless spaz, even if my child wasn’t paying attention to where she was going, you should have been doing so with your own baby-mace.

c) How rude and thoughtless of you to not even check to see if my child was ok or to say sorry, and to instead shout and lay blame on my child.

I feel sorry for your children.

Ahh, I feel better having vented.

Happy Meal is ageless: no decay in a year on a shelf – Boing Boing.

This is gross. A Happy Meal was left out on a shelf and, after one year, there was not a hint of decay or mould or anything! Ew! What does it do to our children’s insides then??

Let children experience a little danger. This article in the Vancouver Sun today talks about a book entitled 50 Dangerous Things (You Should Let Your Children Do) by Gever Tulley.

It suggests, among other things, letting them lick a 9V battery. I (fondly?) remember licking a 9V battery.

Ok, maybe not fondly. But the concept of bubble-wrapped children (love that term) does resonate with me.

I live in a super-secure families-only area where I see children the same age as my almost-5 year old playing alone in front of our house, unsupervised. We’re in a pedestrian only courtyard and I still get terrified of leaving her alone in front of the house where, basically, the only passers-by are fellow families – people who do the very thing I’m not ready to do yet – let my child go out and play without me watching her. Even though there is technically a whole slew of adults surrounding her at any time, I’m still fearful of the one that doesn’t belong. (I’m not so much worried about her getting a few scrapes on her knees.)

Funny. I can’t really recall being 5, so I don’t know just how much I played unsupervised. I do recall being a bit older and riding my bike to the local creek with my friends to look for tadpoles. Will I let my child do that? (Without me, that is….)

B.C. school districts get funding boost.

Well, the BC budget has come out and it’s not doom and gloom for the education sector as had been feared!

In fact, education, as well as sports and arts funding for youths, got a boost.

Yay BC! (I think, I haven’t read through the rest of the budget yet!!)

A happy marriage starts with simple gestures.

Happy relationships are built on the small things, including taking time away from the kids once in a while.

Make coffee for your partner.

Tell them they look sexy.

Talk!

Have fun!

Sounds good to us.

British medical journal discredits link between MMR vaccine, autism.

Autism is a very real spectrum disorder.

The link between autism and vaccination is not so real.

Finally, the Lancet retracted a 1998 article that, for many, was the basis of the autism-vaccine link. For years, we’ve known that article was flawed.

Shaken Richmond baby now blind, police say.

Horrible. Disgusting. Are people really that uneducated that they have no idea that shaking their babies will hurt them? I don’t buy the “ignorance” claim often cited. Other side of the coin, however, I greatly value programs such as PURPLE, developed by a paediatrician at UBC, which teaches parents about crying, babies’ responses, and shaken baby syndrome.

Sadly, I’ve seen the effects. As a paediatric nurse who used to work in intensive care, I’ve seen abused children. You never forget. It makes you angry. This should *never* happen. Our children are the most precious and important creatures on the planet.

Check out PURPLE:

http://bit.ly/7jAU9s

How to keep women on the career ladder – The Globe and Mail.

The challenges of being a female academic: mother, wife, graduate student/professor.

Let me tell ya, it ain’t easy.

But, it can work, if you’re fortunate enough to be in a rather progressive academic system and have a rather sane partner at home.

From the article:

For female academics, the overlap between their pre-tenure years and early motherhood, with its intense family obligations, may impede their productivity, slow their progress on the salary scale and harm their long-term career prospects. And departure from the professional track, which women usually intend to be temporary, often isn’t. It turns out it’s far easier to find the off-ramp than the on-ramp.

Children Take the Stage in Same-Sex Marriage Push – NYTimes.com.

It’s both heartwarming and heartbreaking to see that children are taking the stand to speak up about having gay parents as being normal family life and not detrimental to their development. Parents have to be innately good people and good to their kids. That’s what matters. Not their sexual orientation. Two of the best father figures I had were my gay uncle and his partner. I grew up with love, acceptance, and tolerance. Shame that some kids don’t.