How amazing. It seems that just about every post in this thread is something I hear or read about in what is happening locally though there is alot more emphasis upon the effect of immigration from the south. It seems quite apparent that there is no one acorn that will grow the right sized tree that can be used to resolve these matters forthrightly. The needs and the available resources will have to dictate the basic guidelines that local governments must use in a responsible way to maintain a basic quality of life for all citizens. It is just a matter of definition. The most important element will have to be education. That is, education of the young to become aware of their world, both the material world and the natural world, and to learn how to appreciate the values of both and how to deal with those elements that deter from quality of life, which itself will have to be resolved to some basic common denominators. Perhaps the biggest hurdle to progress on dealing with these kinds of issues is the tendency of the society to capitalize on dilemnas for personal profit. Housing is the best example of this excess. While currently the free market is the prime mover in setting housing starts, the trend is always towards the highest bottom line possible. And so the notion of low-cost or even realistically costed housing is only a dream for the low to modest income levels and seems to draw those who are enterring the market area from outside after having realized substantial gains on their previously owned properties. This cycle seems bent on driving housing into a ever higher spiral of unaffordability. But there are solid answers. A rethink in the manner in which housing is liquidated. A rethink in how housing is constructed and in the types of materials that are used. There are excellent approaches on the books since the 1920s and 1930s. Think Frank Lloyd Wright for example. Again the notion of profit has contributed to continual erosion of natural resources worldwide! (Think Indonesia) I think that is is time to really put the arm on the politicians as is being done in regards to immigration. It is time for our society to begin the task of confronting the dilemnas rather than continuing to make them worse.

A story about Angie's List. I got a freebie trial for a year when they were new to this area. So I was heading out of town, afternoon before got an oil change (quickie place, not dealer). They bunged up the transmission (forget details now but would have stopped me from making that trip). Reimbursed my money and were trying to get me to head to their 'transmission guy'. No way! A girl customer who overheard that fiasco gave me her ex BFs card, said if he couldn't help me he had friends who could. He did body work but sent me to his friend. Sweetest, kindest mechanic I've ever met. Got there at closing time on Friday evening. Still, he stayed, fixed it, and wasn't going to charge me. (I gave him money anyway.) I also gave him highest rec on Angie's List. I bumped into him a few months later. He's very laid back so didn't complain, but the poor guy had since been flooded with snail mail solicitations from AL to join and IIRC he said their fees for business owners were astronomical. He was appreciative of the review, but he was small & just starting out then so had to watch every penny. But we were both kind of surprised they'd solicit business owners that way, seems that would create bias to some extent? I didn't renew when my freebie subscription ran out, but to this day they've not stopped soliciting heavily, even after multiple requests from me to unsubscribe from their list. Aside from having "paid" members in the business community, it's pretty annoying the way they hound people incessantly, a total turn off imho.

Don't make one mistake I did and buy ice packs before you know whether ice is going to work well for you. (I get painful muscle spasms.) Mark a bag of generic frozen peas or corn with a big X so no one eats it, and use that for your cold pack. Wrap it in a thin dishtowel so you don't get cold burns. If you do want to buy gel ice packs, the ones in the sporting goods department at Target or Walmart are better and cheaper than the ones in the drugstore. Since a waist pack is out despite its practicality :-) consider a tiny bag called a "shoulder wallet". I used to use one of these (until it fell apart LOL) and it really was a godsend for forcing me to pare down my stuff to the absolute minimum. About all I could carry was cash, credit cards, my cell phone, sunglasses, a tiny pillbox, and a chapstick. If I really crammed or left out the sunglasses I could get a packet of tissues in there too. :-) MIL 1.0 brought the one I had back from Italy when she visited there and I can't find one identical to it, but I spent a little time hunting around and this one is pretty close.

I was thinking about what I have said on this thread and why it bothers me so much, why it makes me even want to respond, since I usually don't I think it's because I was treated this way as I child and I did nothing to deserve it. I was like a lot of your stepkids - I was a good kid, I never got into any trouble, I made good grades, I was respectful of my elders and good to my siblings. In fact, I have relstionships with my SM's children (my half-siblings), but not with her or BD. I think that's because she never wanted a relationship with me in the first place, and she didn't want her DH (my BD) to either. She pretty much wanted me to "disappear," like so many of you here and other boards wish your step-children would do - just go away. Disappear. So she froze me out. Visitations eventually became non-existent. My BD blames that fact on me, my Mom, and her family. But my Mom never said a bad word about him OR SM. She always told me they loved me. But I DID witness SM scream and accuse my Mom of starving me, of sending me in ugly clothes, of not taking proper care of me. Yep, the same ol' accusatory crap that I read on here... So forgive me if I take what I read here with a grain of salt. I know there are two sides to every story, and I know from experience that sometimes (note, I said "some" times), the accusing side blows things way out of proportion and only sees what they want to see, then accuses the other party without knowing the full story. See, when my SM accused my Mom of starving me, it was because my Mom fed us healthy foods, always cooked with whole grains, we raised our own fruits and veggies, as well as our own chickens and rabbits for meat, we hunted deer for venison... I had a brother with what is now called ADHD, and instead of putting him on Ritalin, my Mom chose to change our diet and she cut out all artificial sweetners, colors, she cut out refined sugars and flours... as a kid, it was miserable! But, in the long run, it was a healthier lifestyle. But when I went to BD and SM's house, they had Pepsi, Cookie Crunch cereal, Oreos... oh. my god. Kid Food Heaven! And I ate like a little piglet! So, then my SM gets it in her head that my Mom is "starving" me. Not the truth, but she didn't even ask, she just accused and threatened that they would take me away from my Mom! So, what does that tell you? That sometimes, things are not always what they seem. Sometimes, you see what you want to see, you run with it, and you start to believe it. Then the negative feelings being to creep in and you start to see that person or people in a negative light, never even thinking there might be another side to the story. And it's hard to change that path of thought, once it's begun. All that to say, I think this bothers me so much because I've lived it as a step-child, and I see my child living it now, too. And that was not my intention. I set out on making it different for my child. I phoned up SM and introduced myself, I told her I respected her, that I knew my child cared about her, that I knew we could relate on a 'mother' level (she had a foster DD), and that I wanted things to be different for my child than they were for me, with my SM. I thought I had done a good job of helping her feel supported. But, a few weeks later, she turned right around and attacked me - literally - in a parking garage. Along with my XMIL. Attacked me and my then-BF (now DH) in front of my child. Over money. It was so bad, I filed a police report. I was scared, and I had to watch my child's face in the car window as they drove off, because it was XH's weekend. And this isn't the first time a domestic violence situation has arisen with them. I take responsibility for not being more aggressive, for letting them feel like they could bully me. I felt like a whimpering dog, being kicked in the stomach when I should have stood up to them, nose to nose, and been strong. But I didn't want to fight in front of my child. It was my choice. So, that's where I'm coming from on this. It upsets me to think that my child is experiencing the same indifference that I did. My child is so kind-hearted, such a good kid (and I'm biased I know, but parents and teachers all tell me that my kid is such a good, well-mannered, kind and polite child) that it tears me up that another person, who has such influence and authority, would treat my child with such indifference - as if my child didn't deserve to exist or deserve their kindness and love. I also want to clarify a contradiction that I may have made here: When I said that faking it 'til you make it doesn't work, then turned right around and said that sometimes you have to act out the part of changing your feelings before it comes to you, I realized that I was contradicting myself. So I thought about what makes it different. And I realized that it's the intention. When you 'fake it til you make it,' that usually means you're faking caring about them until they're gone, with no intention of ever really trying to change your feelings or learning to love them. But when your intention is to really learn to love, to change your feelings toward another person, that's the key. KWIM?