Have you been to a elementary school or even middle school book fair in recent history? The offerings are curated garbage of minimal literary value with product tie-ins to popular IP. Or that “wimpy kid” style of throwaway graphic novel that barely qualifies as reading.
If you want your kids to engage with any content of merit (whatever that looks like to you) you’re going to need to take matters into your own hands and checkout local library books or buy your own books. That’s just reality in 2023.
Unfortunately accurate. It was already pretty tamed around a decade ago before I was a parent.
Today, I’m walking through rows of the most shallowest picture books for 1-2nd graders, and like anime art books and “fortnite/Minecraft/youtuber influencer” books for older kids.
Hi! was an elementary school librarian for 7 years and ran our school’s reading intervention program for 5 of those years. Now I work in a high school library with students who love to read and reluctant readers.
The books don’t matter. They really don’t. Some books can be silly, have tons of pictures, be a book of knock knock jokes, have world records, have everything you ever wanted to know about sharks, or be written in a journal-style like Diary of a Wimpy Kid (which are actually a 4th/5th grade reading level, depending on the book). As long as it gets kids reading, and ENJOYING reading, it really doesn’t fucking matter what it is. If they enjoy it, they’ll continue to read and their tastes in what they read will change and grow with them. Parents’ and teachers’ biggest job is to get them reading, no matter what it is. The absolute WORST thing you can do for children’s literacy is to be a book snob. Some of my most successful growth in readers has been the kids who go home and play Roblox because they have to be able to read and type in chat in order to interact with their friends.
Now if you want to talk about Scholastic book binding, we could absolutely talk about how quickly they fall apart (though the books are usually 1/2 of the price they are at Barnes and Noble, which again, makes them more accessible). ALL BOOKS HAVE MERIT, even the ones I think are dumb.
I was driving through Maryland, it was getting late, and I saw a hotel that was $45 per night. I literally thought to myself, “WTF, I just need a bed, how much could really go wrong if I stay here.”
The room opened straight to the parking lot, and there were cats everywhere outside crying. I said hello to one of them, he was clearly in bad shape and so I went and got some cat food and invited him in and gave him some food. He bit me so I put him back outside and went to sleep.
I was most of the way on the drive home when I noticed I had red welts in a little line down my arm. You fucker, you have to be kidding me.
I basically stripped in the parking lot of my place, went in and took a long shower first thing, and put into the garbage all the clothes I’d had with me, suitcase, shoes, my backpack after taking the computer and notebook out. I put them all in a trash bag in the parking lot and then threw it in a dumpster that wasn’t near any residence. Then I vacuumed my car and took a long shower again.
Fuckin bedbugs. I had no bedbugs carried back to my place after that and that’s how I like it. $45 for the hotel cost me maybe $300 worth of stuff that I decided to get rid of.
Little buddy was suffering. Nobody wants to see that and I had nothing else going on that night anyway. On the other hand, if it turns out he’s an asshole, then I feel comfortable saying he’s not my problem.
Just as a quick note. Cats can have rabies. You might want to go and tell your doctor that you've received a cat bite from an unknown cat and get a rabies shot because once you start showing symptoms you're already dead.
Oh no I totally get it, I would love to save a random street cat, but like, in some random hotel room? You’re the reason hotels have fleas and bed bugs lol. You’re very well meaning, but clearly lacking in common sense.
There are a lot of people who’ve interacted with cats they don’t know. Between the cat, animal control, the hotel, and the local health department, I like how you’ve chosen me as the one in this situation that clearly did something wrong lol.
Fucking bed bugs, indeed. I wouldn’t wish them on my worst enemy except maybe Putin.
They literally cost our entire Spring in tearing our house apart to address them. So much shit moved, tossed out, cleaned, then cleaned again… No idea where they even came from.
I saw this today and searched for any other articles where The Times of Israel uses the word “genocide”… This complete lack of self-criticism is what made Israel an apartheid state.
The article actually addressed this and apparently they are even developing some resistance to diatomaceous earth. The only sure fire treatments described are extreme heat or cold. It’s a pretty horrifying situation we’ve made for ourselves.
Also, the fumigation packets for livestock stalls, but you need to duck tape your contractor bags of clothes, etc. closed and leave them outside for 6-10 days.
I once had a pretty bad bed bug infestation and tested DE by putting a bedbug in a cup of it… It lived for weeks before I killed it by hand. DE only hinders their movement in my experience, you need stronger stuff to kill them.
Cedar oil literally melts them. After weeks of trying everything we could get our hands on ($$$ gone), I tried straight up cedar oil in a spray bottle and found immediate delight in watching those mothefuckers writhe in agony as they shriveled and died. The others tried helplessly to flee, but I was undaunted and hunted them down, one by one. None lived to tell the tale, and all were chemically dessicated and vacuumed up.
There's also the fact that we quit using DDT in most of our insecticides and DDT was great at killing bed bugs it just was also cancer causing in humans.
But the main reason why it’s boom time for bedbugs, according to the review, is that they’ve evolved resistance to many pesticides, our main line of defense. Indeed, these critters are now resistant to “most of the major classes of insecticides,” the review states, including pyrethroids, which is still one of the most commonly used insecticides. They’ve also developed resistance to DDT, which attacks insects in a similar way to pyrethroids.
It’s the republican evangelical/christian way. Defund anything that actually helps people and line the pockets of the lobbyists. It says to do this right in the Bible of course
Will get ever change how they vote? Will they ever realize that voting for the same idiots is how they got here? How many of them have to personally lose a baby or a wife before even reconsidering?
I’ve also often thought to myself, “You know who has it too good? Poor black mothers and children in the deep south, especially Alabama. Someone should fix that”.
Since we both READ THE ARTICLE, I know you also agree with me…right?
A hallow criticism, given that china runs forced labour camps full of Uyghur people (and political prisoners), and is in territory dispute with every neighbor. Not the mentioned, successfully erased the Tibetan people, and is doing the same to Muslims now.
If you think about it, it is quite an accomplishment that they managed to make communist Vietnam dislike them so much, that they'd rather engage in relatively close military ties with the US. Public opinion towards the US is also surprisingly good. I mean, the US committed plenty of atrocities during the war, so you'd expect them to be far more negative than those towards China.
Is it wrong to buy my kids “read banned books” shirts?
Joking, but only sort of. I’m so irritated that this is the world they are growing up in. That I’m going to have to have conversations with them about why people are trying to restrict what they can learn based on bigotry and why that is wrong. There are so many other things they could be worrying about, I hate that we have this as an additional and completely unnecessary distraction.
Completely understand Scholastic’s move here. It’s unfortunate in a vacuum but on the other hand I’m very glad they aren’t simply dropping these titles entirely.
If your kids have read (or you have read to them) some banned books, and agree the reasons they’re banned are wrong, you can buy the shirts, with the caveat that they can only wear them when you’re there to protect them against anyone who reacts with violence. And if they’re old enough to have their own battles with society, maybe you could get yourself a shirt which supports that cause.
While this is fucked up, and I don’t support the bans, ever generation has it’s banned books that are essentially harmless. I’m 37 and remembered hearing about Catcher In The Rye being banned and I thought it was going to be something raunchy. I read some of it years later and was like “this is it?!”
I love that Scholastic is standing strong. My mom still has a magnet on her fridge that I bought for her like 30 years ago at a book fair that says “I love you, Mom!”. The book fairs were the shit back in the day.
Causing a legislative body to be dysfunctional is a very Republican thing. They don’t control the senate or presidency, so they’d prefer for Congress to do nothing at all. Watch, they’ll also scorn democrats later saying “Biden didn’t get anything done!” and “legislative paralysis because of Democrat!” and some voters will happily forget this and believe that.
Generally I wouldn’t disagree with you, but it’s interesting this article doesn’t mention that the entire democratic caucus voted to remove McCarthy.
So yes, this was a Republican effort, but it would not have been possible to put the house in this position without the full support of Democrats. Just interesting this doesn’t mention that at all.
The Democrats didn’t start the process though, a Republican did. And it was only possible because as per of the deal he made to become speaker, they changed it so one House member could start that proceeding while normally it’s half of the House. True, though, Democrats could have let it fail. Not sure what their strategy is - highlight Republican incompetence at the cost of a fu functional House? Pretty clear from last time Republicans can’t/won’t get their shit together enough to elect a Speaker in a short time.
Why wouldn’t they vote against McCarthy? He made a deal then abjectly refused to honor it later. His word is useless so him getting the boot is just desserts.
Why keep a guy in there you can’t at all trust to work with?
I see this as mostly a lose lose situation. Upside is maybe the remaining republicans see enough reason to pick a fair centrist instead of cowtowing to another ineffective hard right representative.
My observation is that whenever some obnoxious person leaves as a leader of the House or Senate, they manage to find someone just as bad or worse. Like Yeah! Newt Gingrich is gone. They came up with Dennis Hastert. Boehner is gone, great! They picked Paul Ryan. Trent Lott is out, great! They came up with McConnell. So it's possible but I doubt they're changing their strategy.
Right, that’s what I addressed in the second part. It is predictable from how it took weeks and 15 votes last time that the republicans wouldn’t elect a new speaker promptly.
At one point our neighbors self treated their bed bugs and it spread throughout the apartment complex and into our unit. In any case, the dog that came to our unit was a beagle. And it made my day in that shitty situation. It was adorable.
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