Car line parents are assholes

I am so bad at this lately.

Like, I must be the shittiest "blogger" out there. But I have an excuse.

Pre-K ate my life. Or at the very least, pre-K is mostly to blame.

For real, this afternoon class thing is not my favorite thing ever and I'm already hoping Charlotte is lucky enough to be in the morning class when she starts next year. I adore that Josie was fortunate enough to get into the UPK program in our district because the cost of private pre-school is kind of ridiculous and, quite frankly, not something we can afford.

It's just the afternoon part I don't care for and really it's for selfish reasons. The girls and I used to go to the gym at least three times a week in the morning, but considering we'd usually get there around 9:30 a.m. and head home by 10:45, it would leave very little time for "down time" before leaving for school at 12:05 p.m. ... so we haven't gone to the gym. Lord help my fluffy ass, we're going to figure this out and hopefully start going after school, but then that cuts into dinner making time and now with the time change it's dark by 5 p.m. and therefore I'm exhausted.

It's a major dilemma in my brain.

But not as big a dilemma as how to reign in my anger with car line.

Pancakes ... as big as your head

Did You Know: A grouping of maple trees is called a sugarbush?

The only reason I knew that was because I've written a few different news stories about Maple Weekend in the past and have retained that knowledge for the future. It comes in handy every year when March rolls around and Mother Nature allows a little warmth to shine down on the groves. Maple Weekend is a big thing in this region and I'm not just talking about New York, though *pops collar* our state tree is in fact the sugar maple.

I'll give you a second to be impressed.

Educational experiences unlike any other

Jump back in time with me for just a sec.

It's 1998 and all my friends are doing it. It's the cool thing. They love hanging out doing this stuff and I'm just like, eh I dunno if it's really my thing. I'm a smart kid, I think, but this is kind of out there even for me.

Academic Decathlon. It's basically the most awesome form of nerdery to go down for high school kids if you don't have a chess or glee club.

Oh, you don't know what AcaDec is? Let me enlighten you. It's several months of studying subjects outside the regular school curriculum. Eventually, through the course of studying, a few schools in the state get together in one location and take multiple exams - Regional Competition. Then from those winning schools a handful from the entire state get together for a weekend and nerd it up for two days - State Competition.

The second day starts at the asscrack of dawn with (at least for us New Yorkers) the math exam. Yeah, calculus at 8:45 a.m.

Admit it right now, you'd die if you had to do math that early these days. I hardly remember my name at that time of the morning let alone can do whatever the hell math I learned in high school. My husband is a robot, so we won't include him in this story because he does math for fun. Weirdo.

Netflix, I love you

The decision has been made. Between the cost of "services" going up at Time Warner and the simple fact we watch one channel in this house, cable will be cut from my list of bills.

We have something like 700 channels and we watch channel 58. All.Day.Long. Or we did until I got wise and moved the bigger TV and ROKU upstairs to the living room. Thank you, Netflix, for having things like BabyFirst and Veggie Tales at the ready. They're educational and captivating and when I need a break or don't have the patience to sit down and educate, you've been my rock. Netflix, you're like another member of the family. And since we pay so littler for you each month, I'm keeping you. You're special to me and are one of the bigger factors to the "cancel cable" decision.

But, for now, let's talk about children's television programming instead of how stoked I am to save money.

Unless it's rated TV-Y or on PBS, kid's TV makes me slightly angry.

OK, it doesn't make me angry. It gets me down right pissed off sometimes.

I'm not talking about Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and cute little shows with some educational value like Sofia the First or Little Einsteins or even Phineas and Ferb (I love those guys!). Hell, I can even handle Secret Agent Oso on repeat on Netflix. What I have a problem with are some of the shows played during the day that my kids have come to love but I am beginning to hate with passion.

A.N.T. Farm. Jessie. Dog With a Blog. Those are just a few.

WTF! She knows her ABCs

Somehow Josie knows her ABCs.

It's absolutely horrible, but I'm not even sure where she learned them. These are bad habits to break.

Next thing you know she'll know how to spell and my life will forever be destroyed. I will never be allowed to plan a surprise trip to get I-C-E-C-R-E-A-M again and forget going to the P-L-A-Y-G-R-O-U-N-D.

Sure, it's entirely possible that my incessant singing of the little ditty drilled it into the ever-changing landscape of grey matter inside her noggin. Or it could have been any one of the LeapFrog toys she plays with in conjunction with the LeapFrog videos on Netflix she's obsessed with. It could even be my mad immersion techniques where I have forced my kids to go to the Y and have fun (I know! I'm such a bad parent) and the amazing childcare staff has given a push in the preschool education department. Someone should buy them cookies.