Strollerderby : yahoo

They Say: School Makes Your Kid Stupid, Fat and Mean

Madeline Holler — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 19:08:00 GMT

If your kid goes to one of those academic and/or desperate to improve schools, where all the little ones are hunkered down drilling math facts and learning phonics and taking practice test after practice test, you might need to worry.

Schools responding to the test score requirements of No Child Left Behind -- many of which have given up recess and other free time to up math and reading test performance -- are failing children (yet again!) in terms of learning how to behave socially.

From Reuters (via Yahoo!):

"The available research suggests that recess may play an important role in the learning, social development, and health of children in elementary school," the research team said in a study published in Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

But today many children get less free time and fewer physical outlets at school "because many school districts responded to the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 by reducing time committed to recess, the creative arts, and even physical education in an effort to focus on reading and mathematics," they added.

These schools, which often serve urban children who don't get much free time outdoors either, are also not helping the rise in childhood obesity. Another topic, another day.

Here's my question: if learning the academic stuff like math and reading is all about putting in hours, why not up those hours? Not by killing off art and P.E. and music, but by extending the school year. The U.S. school year is surprisingly short and the summer break is painfully (and harmfully, if you ask me) long.

You teachers out there might hate me for this, but the normal two-month summer break should be way shortened -- to two or three weeks. Then the days could be less packed, there would be time to bring back music and art and who knows what other long-term learning projects.

What do you think?

Photo: DrRobyn.blogspot.com

Airing the Parental Dirty Laundry

Brett Singer — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 17:00:00 GMT

If you blog, you presumably want readers. And one way to do that is with a snappy headline. One could borrow from supermarket tabloids and go with something sensational and completely fake -- "Sarah Palin Gives Birth To Three Headed Alien" – that would do it. But if you blog about family matters, the truth can work just as well.

For example: this post on Yahoo! Shine.

My son is home!!! And I am really mad at his father.

The title got me to click and see what the heck was going on.

The first sentence was a grabber:

I recently wrote a blog about how I hate it when my son goes to his father's for Christmas.

Then it got better:

So many of you left very nice comments about my tough time while he is gone. There were a few that said I was being petty. Let me Go deeper into this........

I started to feel like a voyeur. This was pretty personal stuff. But it's not like I'm looking in the author's window. I'm reading something she posted on the Internet.

I'm not sure what the initial post was about, but this one tells the tale of a father who brought his son home after Christmas with an injured thumb. The mother was mad because the kid should have gone to the emergency room, and thinks that pop was too cheap to pay the seventy-five dollar co-pay. The injury is described in "ER"-level detail: "When I picked him up, it was black and purple and he could not bend it. We went immediately to the ER. After 2 shots of pain killer, they drilled 2 holes in the nail to relieve the pressure." Presumably the couple is divorced and the boy was spending the holidays with his father, although the post doesn't say that explicitly.

So here's my question. Is this fair to the kid, the father, and everyone else involved? Most of us who blog, whether for pay or play, reveal certain details. But it's one thing to talk about a goofy thing your three year old told you. It's another thing to reveal personal details like the ones on this particular Shine post.

It could be a generational thing. I'm selective about what I share with the world, and I think most folks are. Other people don't mind putting it all out there. (That's why Facebook is so successful.) In this case, I imagine that posting these personal details is therapeutic for the author. It is also interesting to other people; the post has over 100 comments. But if I'm the father, I'd be irritated.

Of course, if I'm the father and I really didn't take my son to the emergency room because I didn't want to spend seventy-five dollars, I'm also a major league jerk. Part of the problem, of course, is that we don't know what the father did or didn't do. It's possible that he weighed in with a comment; I haven't read them all. Still, judgments will be made – by me, the commenters on Shine, and commenters here. That's the nature of blogs. Once it's out there, it's out there. But is there a line that we shouldn't cross when kids and/or our significant others are involved? Can there be such a thing as too much sharing online?

Source: Yahoo Shine

Image (which is completely unrelated to this topic): sas.org.uk

Is Miley Cyrus' First Photo Shoot Creepy?

Baby Bikini and Pregnant Man Top 2008 Weird News List

Babble Talk: Did Mommy Get New Boobies?

A Quiverfull Of Kids

Working Parents Smackdown Part 2 – Dads With Jobs vs Moms With Jobs

Working Parents Smackdown Part 1 - SAHD vs SAHM

10 Things You May Not Know About Pregnancy (and might shock you)

Cole Gamble — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 17:00:00 GMT

I’m gonna take a leap and assume many of your readers out there have been pregnant, or at least has a pregnant partner. In your pregnancy, was there anything that surprised you, that you didn’t see coming. We have a list here of the top ten things that may surprise you about your pregnancy. If you’re one who hasn’t been with kiddo yet, you’ll especially want to read.

Your hair is going to grow faster (around your nipples)

Many women experience changes in hair texture and growth during pregnancy. The hormones secreted by your body will cause your hair to grow faster and fall out less. But these hair changes usually aren't permanent; most women lose a significant amount of hair in the postpartum period or after they stop breastfeeding.

Some women find that they grow hair in unwanted places, such as on the face or belly or around the nipples. Others experience changes in hair texture that make hair drier or oilier. Some women even find their hair changing color.

All Your Private Bits Are Gonna Turn Black

Some women develop brownish or yellowish patches called chloasma, or the "mask of pregnancy," on their faces. And some will notice a dark line on the midline of the lower abdomen, known as the linea nigra (or linea negra), as well as hyperpigmentation (darkening of the skin) of the nipples, external genitalia, and anal region. These are the result of pregnancy hormones, which cause the body to produce more pigment. The body may not produce this increased pigment evenly, however, so the darkened skin may appear as splotches of color. Unfortunately, chloasma can't be prevented, but wearing sunscreen and avoiding UV light can minimize its effects.

For more of the list, check here.

More by this author:

10 WORST. BABY. PRODUCTS. EVER! (Part 1)

The 26 Most Disturbing Kids Movies Ever

blah

Men with Baby Heads

A photo that has nothing to do with the news

Brett Singer — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 21:00:00 GMT

It doesn't have anything to do with parenting either, but it is that rare post that you could show to your kids.

I want to say something cynical, like, "Oh, this is clearly Photoshopped," or even just, "Ah, who gives a crap." But I have to admit that I saw this over on Yahoo! Shine and smiled when I realized what I was looking at. So I figured I'd share. Enjoy.

Source: Yahoo! Shine

More posts that have no news value whatsoever:

Video of baby panda playing

Awww…a baby otter…

Look! Over Here! Baby Animals!

What was your fake baby name?

The Babble List: 25 Great Children's TV Shows That Aren't On DVD

Banned Books Week: Where's Waldo?

The unhealthiest food ever

iPhone app for nursing, diapers, wedding day

Happy Rosh Hashanah, here's a Shofar video

Enormous baby sculpture

More stuff my 3 year old broke

How much is Sarah Palin worth?

Brett Singer — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 17:00:00 GMT

One of Sarah Palin's claims during the debate was that she was "Joe Six-Pack" (shouldn't that be Jane Six-Pack?), part of her folksy, "I'm just like you, America" thing.

So I thought I'd find out just how much money she actually had.

In the past, I've never been terribly interested in Presidential candidates' financial disclosures. This is probably because I assume that if someone has reached a point where they can run for President or Vice-President of the United States, they probably have a few bucks. But when Palin made her claim at the debate last week, my curiosity was piqued.

Sarah Palin and her family seem to be on the lower end of the political wealth spectrum. According to their tax returns, "The Palins paid $22,721 in taxes on $166,080 adjusted gross income last year."

I couldn't open the PDF file provided by the McCampaign (here it is if you want to try: PDF link), so I dug a little more and found Palin's financial disclosure forms from when she ran for office in Alaska. In addition to her family's income, they have investments that look like they total about $200,000. I say "about" because the money is in various funds and the value fluctuates, especially these days. Plus the form is from 2007, so who knows what her money is in now. So maybe the value is between $100,000 and $200,000, depending on the day.
(Note: here is the site where I found the link to her return, which is available here as a PDF file.)

Does that make her rich? Not really. She has five children, and Bristol has one on the way. However, if you include "the estimated value of their property and investments…[the Palins] appear to be worth at least $1.2 million," according to ABC News. I admit that I'm not sure if this number is accurate, but it sounds plausible. Palin and her husband also have no credit card debt, unlike most Americans. Bottom line: even if you go with a low-ball estimate, the Palin family are not exactly living paycheck to paycheck.

What's the point of this exercise? Palin may claim to be "Joe Six-Pack", but I think she's more "Jane Case of Wine." That's fine with me, by the way. But why lie about it?

Image: ABC News

Obama not sure how long he's been married

Morning News: Who's Winning With Only 30 Days Left?

Scrooge McDuck explains inflation

Giant Palin Poster

They say: Sarah Palin should step down

Palin: Women Who Don't Support Other Women Go to Hell

McCain Talks to the Gays: Part Two, Adoption

Should We Raise Little Democrats or Republicans?

Virginia Teachers Get Flack for Pro-Obama Email

Palin's Email Hacked and posted online; UPDATE: Anonymous Hacker Speaks

Giant Palin Poster

Brett Singer — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:00:00 GMT

When I was a kid, I had posters on my walls. The biggest were of Reggie Jackson (great New York Yankee hitter from the late 1970's) and Superman (Christopher Reeve).

This over five foot high Sarah Palin poster is presumably for adults, but I'm not sure if that's better or worse. That is, if it's for children, what child wants this on their wall? And if it's for adults, why is an adult hanging a gigantic poster of the Vice-Presidential candidate on their wall? Even my Reggie Jackson poster wasn't that huge.

To be fair, you can order in three sizes: 12 inches ($19.99 for 4 – such a deal!), 48 inches ($49.99) or 5' 6" ($69.99, described as "life-sized").

Order now for guaranteed Chanukah delivery! (Note: I made that up. Although in theory, it's probably true.)

Source/Image: wallmonkeys.com

Dora the Conservative

Hillary Clinton on Repro Rights

Sarah Silverman says: make granny vote for Obama

Enormous baby sculpture

Palin should read Internet for Dummies

Sarah Palin Makes Repeat SNL Appearance!

Muppet Op-Art

They say: keep your money under your mattress

Important news stories depicted by five year olds

McCain said lipstick on a pig to Hillary

So – who ya voting for?

Sarah Palin, Sportscaster

They say: Sarah Palin should step down

Brett Singer — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 21:50:00 GMT

A few they's are saying it, including "Prominent conservative columnist Kathleen Parker," who was a big fan of McCain's VP choice a few weeks ago.

See, if the Democrats had done this, you would have heard a chorus of "Flip! Flop!" But hey, what's bad for you is good for me, right?

In a column dated September 15, 2008, Parker wrote, "Both a frontier woman and beauty queen, the square-jawed Palin not only neutralized the sisterhood, but she animated the brotherhood. Men are suddenly riveted as never before by the frontal lobes of the vice-presidential candidates." In a column at NationalReview.com dated September 26, 2008, Parker writes that Palin is, "out of her league." Other comments about the woman she thought was just ducky a couple of weeks ago: "If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself." (Emphasis added, for obvious reasons.)

So how can Palin get out of this gracefully? "She can bow out for personal reasons, perhaps because she wants to spend more time with her newborn. No one would criticize a mother who puts her family first." Gawker says that this is how we all got permission to be sexist. That sounds about right to me. No one with any sense is saying that Palin isn't qualified to be Veep because she lacks a Y chromosome. It's because she seems to have no idea what is going on in the world, or even a working knowledge of John McCain's record. Also, it needs to be said that Parker is suggesting that Palin blatantly lie about her reasons for dropping out in order to engender sympathy. Hey, maybe she could cry a little bit too! That'll really make the men weak in the knees!

It's worth noting that other writers are calling for Palin to go back to Alaska and keep an eye on Russia, including Peggy Noonan, David Brooks, George Will, and David Frum.

In closing, here are a couple of the numerous comments from the CNN article:

"Palin should take a flying leap."
Followed by:
"Be nice. She could just float away on her own HOT AIR!"

This one makes no sense at all:
"Let the smear campaign continue…"

Um, how is it a "smear campaign" when writers who support McCain are calling for Palin to get out of the race?

This one is my favorite:
"Ah.. the link was just to some little blog site. Sort of ironic when a tiny blog site says that someone is out-of-their-league."

Dude. That "some little blog site" is the NATIONAL REVIEW.

Same comment, gets better:
"Kathleen Parker needs to READ what the job of VP actually is. A squid with one brain cell would be over qualified for that job! The major thing you need to do is stay awake in the Senate."

Riiiight. Except that the "P" is VP stands for PRESIDENT. As in "next in line to be leader of the free world." Nuclear codes. (Or, as Palin would say, Nook-you-lehr codes.) That type of thing.

Lastly, it's worth pointing out that some random person at Yahoo! Answers was posting the "Should Palin step down?" question three weeks ago. Meaning that perhaps, at times, commentators, even nationally syndicated ones, can be a bit slow on the uptake.

Source/Image: CNN
Other Source: Gawker

Read more:

Sarah Silverman says: make granny vote for Obama

Are your kids aware of the election?

Palin family online - real or fake?

Vice Stay-at-Home "Dude" ... or Something

Sarah Palin, Sportscaster

Muppet Op-Art

Sarah Palin Has A Penchant for Really Beautiful Scarves and More Tidbits For Those Obsessed

Dora the Conservative

McCain, Palin oppose teen pregnancy aid and sex education

Teaching Abstinence Doesn’t Work: Palin’s Preggo Kid.

So – who ya voting for?

Palin's Email Hacked and posted online; UPDATE: Anonymous Hacker Speaks

What Bristol Palin Can Expect, After Baby Algebra

Sarah Palin's Daughter Caught Doing Drugs On Tape

Morning News: Bipolar Markets, Campaigns, Now in Manic Phase

Maxed Out Moms Leaning Towards McCain & Palin

Morning News: No One Told Hillary That Palin Would be There!

Another 8 year old on the terrorist watch list

They Say: Bad News For Gov. Palin

Madeline Holler — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 21:28:00 GMT

There's no such thing as a safe tan.

Even though she made it through getting chided earlier this week for installing a tanning bed in the governor's mansion (she paid for it herself, remember), the whole apparatus and tanning process could bring her this much closer to her running mate, John McCain, who has survived several bouts of skin cancer.

Here's the deal (from Yahoo!):

The link between skin cancer and damage from ultraviolet light from the sun or tanning booths is well known but the review published in the journal Pigment Cell & Melanoma Research suggests that even a little exposure is dangerous.

"The signals in the cells that induce sun tanning appear to be DNA damage," said Dorothy Bennett, a cell biologist at St. George's, University of London, who wrote one of the papers.

"DNA damage is the first step in getting a mutation in cells that could lead to cancer, so there can't be anything like a safe tan."

Guess it's back to the bronzing beads.

Morning News: Palin's Deep Dark Savage Beauty Secret!

They Say: Country Livin's Not So Safe For Kids

Photo: abcnews.com

Palin's Email Hacked and posted online; UPDATE: Anonymous Hacker Speaks

Brett Singer — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 15:15:00 GMT

UPDATE: The "hacker" speaks out! From ZDNet:

A college student identified as Rubico has claimed responsibility for hacking into Sarah Palin’s personal email, and provided a detailed 1st person account of how he hacked into the email account using the password “popcorn” which he managed to reset by successfully answering her security question “Where did you meet your spouse?” by Googling for the answer.

So I guess I was right -- Sarah Palin definitely flunks Computer Security 101. This wouldn't matter if all she was using her Yahoo account for were baby pictures and personal messages, but she used it for Government business.

My original post follows below:

*-*-*-*

I have a few things to say about this so I’m going to just dive right in.

The basics: some computer nudniks got into Sarah Palin's Yahoo email account. This is the account she uses for government business; it has been previously reported that she did this to because "e-mail messages sent to a private address on a 'personal device' like a BlackBerry 'would be confidential and not subject to subpoena.'"

By using a public email account for state business, Sarah Palin is doing something that is so incredibly stupid it defies comprehension. First of all, if the quote from the New York Times is accurate, she doesn't understand how email works. Web based email accounts are not tied to a device. They exist on the server of the email provider, in this case Yahoo. Second, if she told her staff to use accounts like these in order to avoid a potential subpoena, the first question should be – why? If you're conducting state business, shouldn't that be done in a proper manner? If Barack Obama said the same thing, do you think for one minute that the McCampaign wouldn't have an ad out saying, "What is Barack Obama trying to hide?"

The main reason to avoid using a public email account for any sort of sensitive information is that, frankly, those accounts are easier to break into. On the most basic of levels, anyone can tell you where the login page is for Yahoo Mail. But I bet they don't know where the webmail log in page is for the government of Alaska.

So how did the group, who are called Anonymous (clever!) get into Palin's account?
My guess is that the "hackers" just tried a few passwords and eventually got the right one. ("Trig", perhaps? Or "Bistol"?) This article on ChannelWeb points out that "password hacking" is extremely common. For my part, I'm avoiding using the word "hack into" because I don't think guessing a password qualifies as "hacking." It certainly isn't complicated, "Wargames"-level hacking.

None of this excuses that fact that the group who got into her account and emailed some of her messages broke the law and, if they can be found, should be punished. But the fact that Governor Palin put herself in this position should tell us something about a person who could potentially be the President of the United States.

What does this have to do with kids? My children are learning about computers, both by osmosis (they see grown-ups using them) and more formally at school (my oldest is learning "keyboarding" at school.) We expect them to be computer savvy and to understand certain basic things about these wondrous devices we used every day. It's not unreasonable to expect the same level of computer literacy from our candidates as we do from our kids.

Is it November yet? Because I've had a headache for two months.

image: Amazon.com

source: CS Monitor

Important news stories depicted by five year olds

Another 8 year old on the terrorist watch list

7 year old on terrorist list

McCain said lipstick on a pig to Hillary

So – who ya voting for?

Are your kids aware of the election?

Palin for aerial wolf hunting

Was Trig Palin drugged?

Palin family online - real or fake?

McCain, Palin oppose teen pregnancy aid and sex education

Man ejected from Yankee Stadium for lack of patriotism

Sarah Palin, Sportscaster

Divorced Wife to Surrogate Mom: Eh. Nevermind

Madeline Holler — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 18:02:00 GMT

A 12-day-old baby is waiting at the Indian hospital where she was born for laws to catch up with the rather complicated history of her short life.

The baby girl is the biological daughter of a Japanese man and was intended to be the daughter of him and his Japanese wife. She was conceived via eggs donated by an Indian woman and born via an Indian surrogate.

However, shortly after fertilization, the Japanese couple who got the girl's life rolling divorced.

The would-be mom decided she no longer wanted the child. Fine, the dad was still interested. But! The law in India prohibits a single man from adopting a girl baby. Sooooo. Baby,who is an Indian citizen, waits in legal limbo for a Japanese passport.

Baby Manji's paternal grandmother and an Indian friend of the father's are taking care of the girl while all the legal stuff gets sorted out.

Surrogacy is emerging as a booming business for many poor women in India. But looks like their laws need to catch up so all contingencies are covered.

From Yahoo!:

Surrogate mothers in Anand charge about 100,000 rupees (2,500 dollars) for a pregnancy and have been approached by a number of overseas Indian and foreign couples who can have a surrogate baby at a fraction of the cost in Western countries.

Baby Factory Spurs Controversy

Photo: Yahoo!

Is it fair to take pictures of Britney's kids?

Brett Singer — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 01:53:00 GMT

You may have heard about the photographs of Britney Spears smoking while 2-year-old Sean Preston was playing with her cigarette lighter. Well, the actual photo doesn't quite show that. Here it is:

Now, far be it from me to disagree with the celebrity media machine, but this doesn't look as bad as it sounds. In this pic she looks to be taking the cigarettes away from her child. That would be the right thing to do. The better thing to do would be to not smoke at all, and especially not in front of your kids. Second-hand smoke is very dangerous, especially to little lungs. It also makes me wonder if she was smoking while pregnant, which would be much worse. My guess – and I have nothing to back this up – is that she probably was. As a former smoker, I know how hard it is to quit, and it looks to me like the Britster is quite the nicotine addict.

Here's the part that gets me: the photos were taken at her house. Why? Presumably a photog with a mega-ultra-zoom lens – a "Pavarotti", as El Federline famously referred to them on his ill-fated rap album – was suspended from a helicopter or something and took the shot through her window or on her balcony.

She's a celebrity, and over 18 (although emotionally she might be, like, 12, but let's not go there). But her kids aren't. Not to sound like a celebrity defending dipstick ("LEAVE...BRITNEY...ALONE!"), but maybe there should be a law that prevents the kids from being photographed, at least when they're at home. As someone points out over at MomLogic, they didn't ask to be in this bizarre situation.

There are celebrities whose children you almost never see candid pictures of – Madonna, Howard Stern, Christie Brinkley, and I'm sure there are dozens more that I can't think of at the moment. Of course, those people aren't the unbelievable mess that Brit appears to be. At best, this photo shows poor judgment on her part, not only the smoking but also hanging out with her kid in front of an open window where a sleazoid photographer can get a clear shot. Um, curtains? A really high hedge? Move someplace else?

Of course, if nobody wanted to see the pictures, they wouldn't be worth anything, and photographers wouldn't take them. But that's a different topic.

Here are the rest of the photos. Hey, at least she looks pretty good in her bikini.

images: popsugar.com

Britney - Babe-A-Licious Again!

When playgrounds attack, the sequel

20 Disturbing Baby Products

S&M Barbie

Lourdes and Miley kidnapped?

20 mil for pics of twins

When Cynthia called Cindy

Who Would You Name Your Local Sewage Plant After?

Rich or Rehab: Whatever Happened to the Girl From 'Love, Sidney'?

Michael Savage says kids with autism need to get over themselves

Celebrity Baby Naming Hits New Low

Tracy Ullman does Dina Lohan

Brett Singer — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 18:30:00 GMT

Does an IMPRESSION of Dina Lohan. Get your minds out of the gutter, people.

"OK, when Lindsay's heart stopped at Bungalow 8, that was my fault." Funny, nasty, not safe for work.

Make sure to stay with this video until the end where Tracy/Dina turns to a fellow mom and says, "Don't patronize me Lynn... at least my daughter never shaved her head."

Found at LA Times blogs, clip is from Tracy Ullman's State of the Union on Showtime

Live blogging two crappy parenting shows

Dina Lohan bans Lindsay from reality show; other kids, no problem

J Lo is Celeb Mom of the Year, Dina Lohan an also-ran

Whoopi Calls Out Denise Richards

Denise Richards: Charlie Sheen Can Keep His Damn Sperm

Charlie to Denise - I Hope You Get Cancer & Die

Dina Lohan vs. Michael Lohan: Tastes Great! Less Filling!

Dina Lohan - Kids Home Alone & House Fire Breaks Out