In Other Damned News

Avocado has started 11th grade, is pleased with her teachers, and on a Mission from God to ace this year. I would not stand in her way if I were you.

However: the afterschool funding for the school has been completely cut off. Defunded. Even the library cannot stay open more than half an hour after school closes. I don't know if there are programs that receive outside funding (like Mock Trial) that will continue. I imagine sports has dodged the bullet. But after school homework help, and the various activities that gave kids a place to be other than no where useful or interesting, are gone. A wasn't actually using much of this, if any, but the fact that it's been cut out worries her, and with good reason.

I imagine there is check-writing in our future. And I don't mind check-writing, to an extent, when we have something to write checks with (and we're a hell of a lot better off than many, I hasten to add). But I keep thinking that this is the stuff I'm paying taxes for. This, and roads, and the police and firefighters, and libraries. And I don't mind paying those taxes, even when they don't benefit me directly.

Dammit.

It's Been a Week, Hasn't It?

On Tuesday we discovered that some bright person had cloned our credit card and was charging things on a trip from Bakersfield to Las Vegas. The nice people at the credit card company alerted us, charges were denied or accepted as appropriate, and new cards were issued. The system worked as planned.

And then yesterday I lost my keys. I think, on the commute home, but as they're...lost, who's to say.

So there has been a certain amount of scurrying, chez moi in the last day or three.